SALEM, VA (WTKR)- Virginia Wesleyan softball has consistently performed on the mound, at the plate and in the field throughout 2026, but every team has an off-day. That came Thursday for the Marlins.
Wesleyan committed three errors and only mustered four hits, suffering its first defeat of the campaign and falling to Rowan, 3-2, in its Division III Women's College World Series opener. The team fell to 50-1 on the year.
"We've pitched great, we were off on the circle," said VWU head coach Brandon Elliott following the loss. "We've swung the bat well, we were awful offensively. We've played great defense, we were awful there. I feel like we've coached very well, I wasn't very good today either."
The Marlins quickly found themselves in a hole, trailing 1-0 after the first inning thanks to a Profs' RBI single. The eighth-seeded Rowan squad added two more in the fifth, scoring on two more RBI knocks to put VWU down 3-0.
Elliott's squad would see its bats come alive in the seventh and final frame. Alison Pollack hit a fly ball to center that was deep enough to score Morgan Tucker from third on the sacrifice fly, getting the Marlins on the board. Olivia Knight would follow that up with an RBI single to the right-center field gap, but that's as close as Virginia Wesleyan could get.
VWU entered the day as the national leader in both batting average and RBI, but could not overcome a motivated Rowan team that improved to 43-9 on the season.
Tucker, Knight, Taylor McQueen and Sarah Prosser accounted for the hits, with McQueen's double in the seventh serving as the only extra-base knock of the contest for the Marlins. National Pitcher of the Year Hannah Hearl threw the first four innings, scattering four hits and one run, striking out four, walking two and hitting a batter. She took the loss on the mound. Emma Adams followed with three innings in relief, giving up three hits and two runs (one earned), while striking out two.
"I'm not going to yell and scream, that's not going to do us any good," Elliott said. "We need to focus on what we need to do to get better, trot out here and continue to compete and win one game. We shouldn't be trying to worry about what happens here. We've got to worry about [Linfield] and winning that game and then we'll see what happens after that."
"Yes, it sucks, but people have gone undefeated before," added Adams. "We're going to make a different story. We're unique. We don't need to do what's been done before."
Virginia Wesleyan and Linfield meet in an elimination game Friday at 1:30 p.m.
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