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Gabby Teran went up to bat in the bottom of the seventh inning, and Syracuse trailed 8-0. There were two outs and no one on base, but the graduate student had a lot on her plate. The Orange were on the verge of conceding a no-hitter.

Teran quickly went down 0-2 on two swinging strikes and took two balls with help from the home plate umpire, who called Virginia Tech pitcher Keely Rochard’s outside corner pitch to Teran’s liking. Teran crushed a ball down the left-field line mere feet left of the foul pole for Syracuse’s best contact of the game. But a pitch later, Teran was called out on strikes on Rochard’s changeup to secure Virginia Tech’s no-hitter.

Syracuse (19-17, 11-14 ACC) did not record a hit in a crushing 8-0 loss to No. 20 Virginia Tech (29-12, 20-11) on Friday, the first time since the Orange joined the Atlantic Coast Conference. The Orange were one walk away from conceding a perfect game as Rochard’s 21 total putouts consisted of 16 strikeouts and five outs in the field.

“We’re going to see that kid a couple more times,” head coach Shannon Doepking said. “(We need to) stick to the process and to what the game plan is.”

Rochard relies on generating power in her pitches, similar to Syracuse’s Alexa Romero, making her fastball hard to read and even harder to hit. But on Friday, Rochard won the pitching duel, only getting caught in three full-count situations, to which she prevailed twice. The Hokies’ junior pitcher caught the Syracuse batters swinging everywhere, in and out of the strike zone, to which Doepking tried changing where her batters stood in the batter’s box.

But Rochard’s fastball remained intact and effective. Syracuse could rarely run up her pitch count by taking balls and chucking fouls.

“It was inevitable that we were going to strike out,” Doepking said. “If we see a couple more pitches, eventually we’re going to get to that kid.”

Syracuse was shut out for the fifth time this season and never really made a clear bid to even getting on base. But Angel Jasso almost ended that bid as early as the first inning. Despite fielding a brisk grounder to second base, Jasso sped to first, determined to beat the throw, but was forced out roughly a second before her right foot hit first base.

But much like in the field, Syracuse lacked the production of its veteran leaders. Neli Casares-Maher struck out three times on top of making two errors in the field. Teran also recorded two fielding errors, struck out twice and ran over her own bunt running to first.

“If we expect to win any games moving forward it can’t look like that,” Doepking said. “That was just sloppy, it was just a very sloppy softball game.”

With three more games against Virginia Tech and another upcoming series against No. 13 Clemson, Doepking’s focus is hitting the reset button and getting Syracuse in the best position possible heading into the ACC Tournament.

“It can’t get much worse. We just got no hit.”

Published on April 30, 2021 at 7:53 pm

Contact Alex: ahcirino@syr.edu