March 18, 2001

FORT MYERS, Florida - Junior Amherst College pitcher Lauren Peloquin (Berkeley, MA) tossed a complete-game, four-hit shutout in the opener, and the Jeffs exploded for 26 runs in the nightcap, as the softball squad swept a season-opening doubleheader against Hamilton College on Sunday morning. 

Peloquin, the NESCAC's Player of the Year as a sophomore, provided Amherst with all it would need in the opener, contributing a single and a double to a dominating performance on the mound. The junior mowed down a career-high 16 Hamilton batters, scattering four hits over seven innings of work. 

Offensively, the Jeffs received a stellar day from senior co-captain Carline Kelly (S. Dartmouth, MA), who finished 2-3, with a single, a triple and three runs batted in. Combined with Peloquin's mound work, it would be more than enough to help the Jeffs to the 5-0 win. Peloquin, who already owns almost every school pitching record, picked up one more in the opener, passing Co-Head Coach Jen Shea '98 as the school's all-time winningest pitcher with 41 career victories. 

In the second game of the twinbill, the two teams' offenses were on display much more than their pitching, with five different Amherst players posting multiple-hit performances. 

Leading the offensive surge was senior co-captain Meg Nelson (Middletown, CT), who walloped her first homer of the year as part of a 2-4 effort from the plate. Sophomore Missy Mordy (Issaquah, WA) finished with two singles and a double with 2 RBIs, sophomore Tamara Baer (Amherst, NY) added three hits, and sophomore Emily Melia (Hingham, MA), who picked up the win on the mound, added a pair of hits from the offensive end. 

All told, the offense accounted for a school record-tying 26 runs, as the Jeffs completed the sweep of their conference foes in the two teams' only meetings during the 2001 regular season. The Jeffs, who play 10 of their 30 regular-season contests in Fort Myers, Florida, have four more contests over the next two days, including games on Monday against the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth, and against the Rams of Framingham State College.