DAHLONEGA, Ga. – The UWG softball team split day one of this weekend's tournament in Dahlonega, dropping game one against the nation's top ranked team before rebounding with a run-rule victory in the nightcap.
 
West Georgia (2-4) played the defending National Champion North Georgia Nighthawks tight in game one and were a bad start away from going toe-to-toe with the tournament hosts.
 
The Wolves' bats came to life in the evening contest against Emmanuel, slugging 11 hits as a team and scoring 13 runs, which is tied for the most runs scored in a single game under head coach Kristy Burton.
 
Game One: #1 North Georgia 5, West Georgia 1
The Wolves fell behind early against North Georgia (6-0), who was playing as the road team on their home turf. The Nighthawks loaded the bases with back-to-back walks and a hit-by-pitch. Another hit-by-pitch got UNG's first run, and then a single scored two runs and a sac fly made it a 4-0 lead for UNG.
 
West Georgia got on the board with a Rylee Green double that scored Emerson Miller to cut the deficit to one.
 
Destry Lambert came on in relief in the first inning, and facing a 4-0 deficit, pitched seven innings of four-hit softball and surrendered just one run to the top team in the country.
 
UNG's lone run off of Lambert came in the sixth, stretching their lead to 5-0.
 
UWG had just two hits coming from Green and Zekylah Boyd.
 
Game Two: West Georgia 13, Emmanuel 5
 
Blaire Bizette turned a leadoff walk by Megan Waites into a first inning run by tripling home Waites. Bizette then scored herself as a productive out by R.J, Janke gave the senior first basemen an RBI and the Wolves a 2-0 lead before Calli Hardison picked up the ball in the circle.
 
Hardison put up zeroes against the Emmanuel offense, pitching around her only real trouble in the fourth. Meanwhile, the UWG offense got three runs in the third to make it a 5-0 game. Boyd and Bizette got on after hit-by-pitches and Boyd scored on Janke single, and the next two runs scored on a double by Emerson Miller.
 
West Georgia broke it open with five runs in the fifth as three straight singles, the third by Janke, pushed the first run across to make it 6-0. Madison Vandergriff then picked up an RBI single and MaKayla Register drove in two with a single of her own. The 10^th run of the game and fifth of the inning scored on a wild pitch.
 
Emmanuel finally broke through in the bottom half of the fifth, pushing three runs across.
 
Janke gave the Wolves two of those runs back, slugging her first home run of the season and the 18^th of her UWG career. The Wolves got the lead back to 10 runs as Miller scored on a fielder's choice.
 
Emmanuel added two more runs in the sixth to account for the final tally.
 
Janke had a monster game, ending the night 3-for-4 with the home run, five RBIs and a pair of runs scored. Bizette and Register also had multi-hit games and picked up RBIs.
 
Hardison's final line was 4.2 innings pitched with no runs allowed.
 
Up Next
The Wolves continue UNG's tournament on Saturday, taking on the same Emmanuel team at 2 p.m. and then squaring off with Catawba in the final at 4 p.m.