Box Score 1 | Box Score 2 KANKAKEE, Ill. – Parkland softball dropped both games of a doubleheader at Kankakee on a wet afternoon at Kankakee Community College. The Cobras dropped game one, 4-0, and then lost a rain-shortened game two, 11-6. With the setback, the Cobras' record moves to 10-6 on the season.

The two losses snapped Parkland's three-game winning streak. Despite the setback, Kirbie Mendenhall hit her first home run of the season and Summer Johnson led the team with two RBI to highlight the afternoon.

Up next, Parkland remains on the road with a pair of weekend doubleheaders. On Saturday, April 6, the Cobras play Spoon River in Canton, Ill., at 1 p.m. and then battle Lewis & Clark on Sunday, April 7, at 1 p.m.

Game 1: Parkland 0, Kankakee 4

Pitchers Kate Beckemeyer and Tori Witruk kept Parkland in the game, allowing three earned runs, but the Cobra offense was limited to just three hits in game one.
The Cavaliers jumped out in front with a pair of runs in the first when the first four batters each reached base. After the Cobras held them off the board over the next three innings, the home team added an insurance tally in both the fifth and sixth innings.

Despite being held scoreless, the Cobras created a couple of opportunities that they were unable to cash in on. Kate Beckemeyer reached third base with one out, but was stranded, in the first inning, and then a double play by Kankakee nullified a lead-off double by Bella Coffey in the second frame. The Cobras would put two runners on with two out in the third, fifth and sixth innings, but were unable to get the timely hit.

Beckemeyer and Witruk each tossed three innings, allowing two runs apiece, though only one of Witruk's runs was earned.

Game 2: Parkland 6, Kankakee 11 (5 inn.)

Kirbie Mendenhall hit her first home run of the season, but untimely errors hurt the Cobras in an 11-6 defeat. Parish took her first loss of the season despite four of the six runs being unearned. Mendenhall pitched two-thirds of an inning in relief and was pegged with five unearned runs.

Breaking out of their offensive slump from the first game, the Cobras took the lead in the first inning and second inning with a combined three runs. A Camryn Skundberg RBI groundout gave Parkland a 1-0 lead in the first, and then Mendenhall's home run and a wild pitch regained the lead for the Cobras in the second inning, 3-1.

The game got away from the Cobras in the bottom of the fourth when Kankakee scored nine times to turn a 3-2 Parkland advantage into an 11-3 deficit.

In the ensuing half inning, the Cobras cut the deficit back to six, as Poehler singled in a run and a double from Summer Johnson scored two more. However, the game was called due to rain at the conclusion of the top of the fifth.