WEST LIBERTY, W.Va. – The West Liberty University softball team kept its season alive here Friday with an impressive bounce-back afternoon in the NCAA Division II Atlantic Region I Tournament at the WLU Softball Complex.
    After falling to Lock Haven in a 15-inning heartbreaker on Thursday, Coach Herb Minch's Hilltoppers rebounded with a 6-2 win against Concord (38-21) on Friday afternoon and had opened up a 6-2 lead against Lock Haven in the final elimination game when it was suspended by darkness after four innings.
    West Liberty (37-18) and the Bald Eagles (32-18) will return to the WLU Softball Complex at 10 a.m. Saturday to complete the suspended game with the winner advancing to play Shepherd in the finals of the double-elimination tournament.
    Shepherd (40-16) is the lone unbeaten team remaining after outlasting Lock Haven, 3-0, in Friday's winner's bracket final, which was delayed for two hours by an early-morning storm.
    The West Liberty/Lock Haven winner will have to beat the Rams twice on Saturday in order to advance to next week's Super Regional.
    "There was some concern we might be a little tired after that 15-inning game," Minch said, "but our girls rose to the challenge today. We got the bats going a little bit and it just snowballed from there. We have a big task ahead of us but I think we've found our confidence again and are back to playing West Liberty softball."     After throwing 256 pitches in her 15-inning complete-game win against West Liberty on Thursday, Atlantic Region Pitcher of the Year Bekah Slattery hurled 10 shutout innings against Shepherd on Friday only to come away as the hard-luck loser.
    The Rams' Taylor Stocks gave up a 2-out single in the bottom of the first and didn't give up another hit until the 10th inning when Lock Haven's Amanda Criss smoked a one-out double to left center.
    After a single and a walk loaded the bases, Lori Sturgill came on in relief to retire the next two hitters and keep the Bald Eagles off the board.           The Rams finally broke through against Slattery in the top of the 11th with three runs on four hits and Sturgill closed things out in the bottom of the inning for the win.
    Sturgill had two hits and an RBI while Ashley Burger also singled twince for Shepherd. Rachel Taylor added an RBI double in the 11th and Leann Brown followed with a run-scoring triple.     Katie Beeman put West Liberty on the board first with a two-run home run in the top of the third but the Mountain Lions got leadoff home runs from Amber Stokes and Jenna Witt in the third and fourth innings, respectively, to even the score at 2-2.
    The Hilltoppers broke the game open with four runs - three unearned - in the top of the fifth with Haley Collett's two-run single putting WLU ahead to stay.
    Kat Donzella led the Hilltopper attack with two singles and a double while Sydney Bennington added a pair of base knocks.
    Taylor Bonnett, who worked her way out of a bases loaded, no out jam in the bottom of the fourth with back-to-back strikeouts and a comebacker to the circle, blanked Concord over the final four innings to pick up the win in relief.     In the rematch of Game One, West Liberty drew first blood against Lock Haven starter Kayla Gee with three straight two-out singles by Donzella, Sydney Bennington and Beeman in the top of the first. Donzella sprinted home from second on Beeman's single up the middle, sliding around the tag from the catcher.
    That lead proved short-lived as Chloe Kennedy led off the second inning for LHU with a solo home run. The score remained tied until the Hilltoppers bats went to work again in the bottom of the third.
    Allie Cook led off with a double and moved to third on a Kate Meloun single. A walk to Donzella loaded the bases and everybody moved up a base on a Sydney Bennington single. Beeman singled Meloun home and Donzella slid across the plate just ahead of the throw when the centerfielder had trouble coming up with the ball. An RBI grounder by Anna Paterson and a wild pitch scored two more runs, putting WLU on top by a 6-1 count heading to the fourth.
    With darkness rapidly settling in, the Bald Eagles got one run back on an RBI single from Slattery in the top of the fourth and officials suspended the game after West Liberty failed to score in the bottom of the inning.