After Columbia evened the score in the top of the fourth, the Crimson regained the lead in the bottom half with a dramatic suicide squeeze.

Whitton began the inning with a stand-up double and moved to third on a sacrifice bunt by Koppel. That set the stage for Goldberg, Saturday’s heroine, to come through in the clutch once again.

She rose to the occasion, laying down a textbook squeeze bunt. Buehler fielded it but was unable to flip the ball to Ryan in time, and Whitton slid under the tag to give her team a 2-1 advantage.

“We scored a run during the regular season off Buehler on a squeeze, too,” Allard said. “They were playing [Goldberg] to hit, and Tiffany was getting good jumps off the bag, so I said, ‘Let’s try to sneak this in.’”

And while the Crimson threatened again, it wasn’t able to get the key hit it needed and stranded three baserunners over the last two innings.

Harvard 4, Cornell 3

A solid relief outing by Tanner, clutch hitting and baserunning from Williamson, and yet another dramatic game-winning RBI from Whitton were just enough for the Crimson to triumph over Cornell and exonerate itself from three major errors that nearly cost the team the game.

Williamson was flawless against Sterman. She went 4-for-4 and started the game-winning rally in the bottom of the ninth with a two-out single up the middle.

“My teammates helped me a lot by telling me what [Sterman] was doing today before I got up,” Williamson said.

A runner at first with two outs usually isn’t a significant scoring threat, but Whitton—the nation’s leader in RBI—is not your usual hitter. To the surprise of no one, Whitton doubled to left-center. Williamson turned on the jets and Allard waved her in from first, setting up the climactic play at the plate.

The throw from left field had Williamson beat by a step, and Cornell catcher Sandra Alvarez was in position to make the play with the plate seemingly blocked. But Williamson stunned her with a feet-first slide through her legs just as the ball hit her glove. Alvarez could not hold on, and Williamson’s feet touched home to win the game for Harvard.

Williamson’s run capped off a day in which Harvard had pounded Sterman for 12 hits, a vast improvement from when the Crimson fell 5-1 to Cornell on April 21.

“The last time we faced her we couldn’t lay off her up pitch,” Allard said. “So every out we had was popped to first base, popped to second base. Today, we were determined to swing at good pitches.”

Tanner picked up her first career win, pitching three innings in relief of the starter Brotemarkle without giving up an earned run. Tanner had struggled in earlier outings this season but finally came off age on Saturday.

Allard was confident Harvard would win, but faulted the team for prolonging a game it should have comfortably won in seven innings.