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The Harvard softball team spent its weekend in New Haven, picking up three wins in four games against Ivy rival Yale. The Crimson shut out the Bulldogs in its last matchup, 6-0, after a weekend of closely contested tilts. Harvard has now won nine of its last 10 games.

“We definitely have a large portion of our underclassmen stepping up,” junior Jillian Leslie said.

HARVARD 2, YALE 0

A scoreless seven innings for both the Crimson (20-14, 9-3 Ivy) and the Bulldogs (12-26, 5-7) forced the first game of the weekend into extra innings. Harvard broke through with two runs in the top of the eighth to win it.

Strong pitching by both teams highlighted the matchup. Captain Morgan Groom gave up only five hits over all eight innings she threw, picking up her sixth win of the year.

Yale had scoring opportunities in the bottom of the sixth and the seventh, with base runners in scoring position in both of these late innings.

Groom ended Bulldog hopes by inducing a ground out in the sixth and a pop up and ground out in the seventh to end the innings.

Crimson bats came alive in the eighth with Senior Haley Davis leading off with a single. At the next at bat Junior Giana Panariello doubled to deep center field to send Davis home for the first RBI of the day.

Captain Zoe Galindo laid down a sacrifice bunt to move Panariello to third and freshman Rhianna Rich ripped her own double to center, allowing Panariello to score and advancing Harvard to 2-0 to secure the win.

HARVARD 5, YALE 4

The second game on Saturday was a close bout with another full game pitched by a Crimson pitcher. Junior Taylor Cabe improved to 11-3 on the mound thanks to a three run rally in the fifth to clinch the game.

“Especially on Saturday we played with a lot of grit. The first game was decided by extra innings and the second was decided by one run,” Groom said. “I think we really pushed hard every single inning to play the best that we could.”

The Bulldogs put a run an inning on the board for the first four, but Harvard was able to cut their lead in half in the bottom of the fourth with RBIs from Panariello and Davis.

Junior Catherine Callaway started off the inning with a triple down the right field line and scored after Panariello followed suit with a triple of her own.