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CATHEDRAL CITY, Calif. - Purdue was unable to rally after giving up a big inning by Arizona in game 2 of the Mary Nutter Classic on Friday.
The second game of the Mary Nutter Classic featured a matchup with one of the most powerful hitting teams in the country, ninth-ranked Arizona, which lived up to the ranking, beating the Boilermakers 13-1 in five innings.
After Kaitlynn Moody (0-3) held the Wildcats scoreless in the first inning, the mighty Arizona (14-0) offense propelled one runner home in the second to take an early lead, a lead they would not give up. Moody through two innings of work struck out three batters using a variety of speeds which kept Arizona guessing at the plate.
Inside the other circle, Nancy Bowling (3-0) had everything working early, especially her rise ball. Bowling retired six straight Purdue (2-9) batters to start the game and did not look back giving up only three hits and striking out eight in her five innings of work.
After going quiet in the first inning the Arizona bats heated up on a cool night in the desert in the third. Mo Mercado came to the plate looking at bases loaded with nobody out and sent a ball over the center field fence which cleared the bases to extend the Wildcat lead to five. Two errors in the inning allowed the frame to continue and the Wildcats made the Boilermakers pay, scoring four more runs, two from another long ball off the bat of Dejah Mulipola.
Tayler Wullenweber got Purdue on the board in the hit column in the third inning, but was stranded as Bowling continued to work through the lineup. Maya Hughes led off the fourth inning off with a standup triple, her first of the season, and scored on a Mallory Baker RBI double. Baker had a productive first day of the Mary Nutter Classic as she finished 2-5 producing two runs and scoring one.
Arizona outhit Purdue 10-3 and committed no errors compared to the Boilernakers' three.
Purdue finished 1-1 on the day after defeating UC Santa Barbara 6-4 in game 1 and will continue action Saturday starting at 6 p.m. ET against Houston then at 11 p.m. against Stanford.
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