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ITHACA, NY –  The Alfred University softball team split a key Empire 8 Conference doubleheader with host Ithaca Thursday afternoon, rebounding from a 3-2 loss in the opener to take the second game, 3-1.
 
With the split, AU controls its own destiny in the Saxons' quest to win the Empire 8 title outright and host next weekend's conference championship tournament. If AU (5-3 Empire 8) wins its final four conference games the Saxons would finish with a 9-3 mark and finish a game ahead of Ithaca, which has wrapped up Empire 8 play with an 8-4 league mark.
 
In Thursday's second game, junior pitcher Alison Wickwire (Towanda, PA/Towanda) tossed seven solid innings, allowing an unearned run on four hits while striking out two to improve to 10-3 on the year.  Sophomore Jasmine Picini (Alexandria, VA/West Potomac) went 2-for-3 with a pair of RBIs in support of Wickwire. Her double in the second inning scored Wickwire and her RBI single in the fourth plated senior outfielder Samijo Scheer (Corning, NY/Corning East) to put AU up, 2-0.
 
After Ithaca scored in the sixth to cut its deficit in half, AU got an insurance run in the seventh, when freshman pinch runner Hannah Lawrence (Spencer, NY/Spencer-Van Etten) scored on a sacrifice fly by sophomore second baseman Dana Torchia (Pompton Plains, NJ/Pequannock Twp.).
 
Freshman third baseman Liz Thompson (Horseheads, NY/Horseheads) went 2-for-3 for the Saxons.
 
In the opener, Ithaca scored three runs in the first and held off the Saxons, who scored a run in the second on a solo homerun by sophomore shortstop Nicole Maher (Newark, DE/Caravel Academy) and another in the third, when Maher's sacrifice fly scored Thompson.
 
Thompson, Wickwire, Scheer and senior outfielder Rachel Guszick (Sparrowbush, NY/Port Jervis) all had base hits for AU. Wickwire suffered the pitching loss for the Saxons, allowing three earned runs on four hits and striking out four.
 
AU plays host to Empire 8 foe Elmira on Friday (April 25) for two games, beginning at 3 p.m. The Elmira games will complete a doubleheader begun April 14 but postponed due to poor weather. The teams will resume the first game of the twinbill with Elmira leading 8-6 and AU batting in the bottom of the fifth with one out and a runner on first. The second game of the doubleheader will follow. Alfred wraps up its conference slate with a 1 p.m. doubleheader at Utica on Saturday (April 26). If AU wins all four games, the Saxons will host the conference's four-team championship tournament, the winner of which earns the league's automatic bid to the NCAA championship tournament.