Orme Twirls No-Hitter as No. 25 Softball Cruises Past No. 21 Maryland

Friday, February 24

Waco, Texas

1:30 PM

Baylor

9-1

#21 Maryland

9-2

Maryland

Baylor

Orme Twirls No-Hitter as No. 25 Softball Cruises Past No. 21 Maryland

2/24/2023 5:12:00 PM | Softball

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By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider
            Dariana Orme and Fridays go together like peas and carrots, peanut butter and jelly, chicken and waffles.
            After throwing the first seven-inning perfect game in the history of the Baylor softball program a week ago, the junior right-hander faced just two batters over the minimum and tossed her second no-hitter in leading the 25^th-ranked Bears to a 5-0 win over No. 21 Maryland on Friday in their opening game of the Baylor Invitational.
            "It definitely felt so good," said Orme, who improved to 4-1 with a 0.58 ERA. "Every day we come out here, we get to have fun and play with a lot of freedom, just because we all trust one another."
            Baylor (10-1) came back to defeat Minnesota, 3-2, in eight innings in the Day One, with sophomore Shaylon Govan driving in Taylor Strain with the winning run on a sacrifice fly to deep right field.
            "I'm not sure who scheduled these two Big Ten powers back-to-back on the same day," said Baylor coach Glenn Moore, whose team is off to its best start since starting out 14-0 in 2011. "But if you're going to, you need a performance like we had with Dari. It's amazing what she did against a very good team. I'm still a little amazed at what she's doing this early in the season with the offseason she had."
            Mixing in her pitches, Orme (4-1) struck out four of the first five batters before walking Trinity Schlotterbeck with two outs in the second.
            The Bears got on the board in the second, when Emily Hott had a one-out single up the middle, stole second and scored on Sydney Collazos's two-out RBI single to right.
            After the Terps' Taylor Liguori reached base on an error leading off the third, Orme sat down the last 15 batters and finished with a career-high 11 strikeouts.
            "Sydney was doing a great job back there," Orme said of Callazos, "because my pitchers were on, but we were trying to battle the strike zone with the umpire. Sydney continued to tell me to trust her and that she's going to work really hard to get me strikes. And that's what she did.'
            Baylor broke it open against the Terps (9-2) with a three-run homer by Govan in the third, her third homer of the season. The Bears added another tally in the fifth, when Toven led off with a walk and eventually scored on an RBI groundout by Hott.
            "We always know that when Shay's got the bat in her hands, it's very dangerous," Orme said. "We're always excited to have her up in those clutch situations. She is just on fire right now."
            BU improved to 2-1 versus ranked teams, falling 11-7 to a top-5 Arkansas team at the season-opening UNLV Rebel Kickoff in Las Vegas and knocking off top-ranked Oklahoma, 4-3 last weekend at the Getterman Classic.
            After blasting six home runs in a 17-0 run-rule win over Texas A&M-Commerce, Minnesota (6-5) was stymied by Baylor's pitching combo of Aliyah Binford and freshman RyLee Crandall (3-0).
            For the Gophers, the dam burst in the bottom of the second inning. After a leadoff triple to right by Binford, Hott hit a double to the gap in right-center field and then scored on a sac fly by Presleigh Pilon for the early 2-0 lead.
            Crandall (3-0) came on in relief in the fourth, working around a pair of walks by Binford. She gave up a run in the fifth on a two-out walk and a pair of errors in the fifth, then the Gophers tied it with a two-out RBI single to right-center field by freshman Jesse Oakland.
            Using the international tiebreaker rule that places a runner on second base to open the inning, the Gophers threatened in the eighth, when Taylor Krapf was hit by a pitch and pinch-hitter Jacie Hambrick moved the runners up with a sac bunt.
            Delanie Cox appeared to drive in the go-ahead run with a fielder's choice grounder that glanced off Crandall's glove. But on review, Addison Leschber was tagged out by Collazos on a throw home by second baseman Pilon.
            With the bases loaded after Sydney Strelow drew a walk, Hott snuffed out the threat when she caught a sinking line drive by Amani Bradley.
            "Thank goodness, they hit that right to her," Moore said. "That was a laser to her. We had a few breaks, but we dug so many holes for ourselves that we let them back in it, I thought, with the mistakes we made. We probably needed to punished a little bit more for those types of mistakes, but I'll take it and we'll get better."
            In the bottom of the inning, designated runner Taylor Strain moved to third on a Toven grounder to the right side and then came home with the winning run on Govan's sac fly to right on a 3-2 pitch by Autumn Pease (3-3).
            Already locked in as the No. 1 seed for the bracketed part of the tournament, Baylor will finish round-robin play with a matchup against Texas A&M-Commerce (2-11) at 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Maryland plays Minnesota at 10 a.m., then the semifinals are scheduled for 2:30 and 5 p.m.

WACO, Texas -- Dariana Orme – the reigning national pitcher of the week – fired a no-hitter while striking out a career-high 11, leading No. 25 Baylor to a 5-0 win over No. 21 Maryland in the opener of the Baylor Invitational, on Friday afternoon at Getterman Stadium.

Baylor (9-1) saw Orme (4-1) work her second career no-hitter, just a week after she worked the first seven-inning perfect game in program history, a 7-0 win over Stephen F. Austin last Friday. Orme, the National Fastpitch Coaches Association National Pitcher of the Week, used 95 pitches – 66 for strikes – only issuing a two-out walk in the second inning and working around a leadoff error in the third.

Orme, junior out of Vacaville, Calif., retired 21 of the 23 hitters she faced, starting 18 off with first-pitch strikes. She lowered her ERA to 0.58 and has worked 24 innings on the year, allowing only 13 hits.

The Bears have now shutout four of their last five opponents, with the only blemish coming in a 4-3 win over No. 1 Oklahoma on Sunday at Getterman Stadium, Baylor's first win over a top-ranked foe since 2009.

Orme worked four innings in a start vs. the Sooners, allowing only an unearned run, before being relieved due to pitch-count limitations. The Fresno State transfer has not allowed an earned run over her last three starts, and has worked 18.1 consecutive innings without an earned run scoring.

The play of the game came in the seventh inning with one out, when Maryland clean-up hitter Amelia Lech drilled a sinking line drive into leftfield. Baylor's Taylor Strain made a hard-charging, diving grab towards the foul line to rob Lech of a knock and preserve the no-hitter for the Bears.

The Bears now own a 1.88 team ERA through their first 67 innings of 2023, fanning 75 and allowing only 44 hits.

Maryland starter Courtney Wyche (4-2) suffered the loss, allowing four runs on four innings. Nicole Bodeaux worked two innings in relief for the Terrapins.

The Terps had a seven-game winning streak snapped with the loss to the red-hot Bears. Maryland has earned wins over No. 3 Oklahoma State and No. 22 Oregon on the year and entered the Baylor Invitational with its highest ranking in any poll since 1999. Maryland opened the Baylor Invite with a five-inning perfect-game win over Texas A&M-Commerce and are coming off a weekend that saw them sweep two-game sets with Virginia and North Carolina.

Baylor plated a run in the second inning, three in the third and one in the fifth.

THE RUNDOWN
Baylor opened the scoring in the bottom of the second inning, getting a one-out single from Emily Hott, who stole second for her third steal of the year. After the second out, Sydney Collazos singled into rightfield on a 1-0 offering, allowing Hott to score.

In the third, Baylor plated three runs, getting a one-out walk from Strain, who motored to second after a single through the left side from Amber Toven. Govan then cranked a 1-2 offering out to centerfield, a three-run blast that marked her third homer of the year.

Baylor added on in the fifth, as Toven drew a leadoff walk and Govan singled into centerfield on a two-strike offering. After a sacrifice bunt pushed both runners into scoring position, Hott chopped into an RBI groundout, allowing Toven to score for a 5-0 lead.

HIGHLIGHTS
The Bears plated five runs on seven hits, getting another big game from first baseman Shaylon Govan. A native of Katy, Texas, Govan belted her third homer of the year, a three-run blast in the third, going 2-for-3. She owns 22 RBI through her first 10 games of the year and is off to a .517 (15-for-29) average to open the 2023 season.

Baylor got a two-hit game from Collazos, who drove in a run, with Toven, Hott and McKenzie Wilson adding knocks.

WHAT'S NEXT
Baylor wraps up the four-game opening day of the Baylor Invitational with the finale of the day vs. Minnesota. First pitch on ESPN+ and the Baylor Sports Network, available on 101.3 FM, is slated to begin 30 minutes following the conclusion of the Minnesota vs. Texas A&M-Commerce game.

- BaylorBears.com -