No. 1 Eastern Connecticut 7, No. 2 UMass Dartmouth 3 
Carley Stoker didn't allow a hit through six innings and three-time defending champion and top seed Eastern Connecticut State University moved into the championship round of the 2023 Little East Conference softball tournament with a 7-3 victory over second-seeded University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Friday afternoon at Clyde Washburne Field. 
 
With its 13^th straight LEC tournament win over four years and 20^th straight triumph this year, No. 24 ranked Eastern (28-8) moves into the championship round of the tournament Saturday at noon, needing one win to secure its eighth tournament title in the last 13 years. Eastern drew a first-round tournament bye and opened with an 8-0, five-inning win over fourth-seeded Castleton University Thursday. 
 
Stoker (15-1) won her 11^th straight decision this year and improved to 36-4 in her three-year career with a complete-game three-hitter (all infield hits) with eight strikeouts and four walks and did not allow an earned run. Stoker was within three outs of recording the 42^nd no-hitter in program history before Larissa Piessens ground a 1-1 pitch up the middle leading off the seventh, where shortstop Emma Marelli smothered it near the second base bag but her hurried throw was too late to get Piessens.  Trailing 7-0, UMass scored all of its runs in the seventh on its three infield hits, a walk, and two errors. 
 
Eastern, which trimmed UMass a month ago twice in low-scoring games, scored two runs in the first, second and fourth to move out to a 6-0 lead against Kaitlyn Shirshac (14-4) and was never seriously threatened.  Leadoff hitter Sarah Remillard reached three times with a triple, hit-by-pitch and walk and scored three runs. Julia SanGiovanni also reached twice with two singles and the 70^th career hit-by-pitch of her career while Marelli reached three times with a double and two walks. Eight players shared the team's nine hits. 

No. 4 Castleton 11, No. 5 Rhode Island College 1 (5 Innings)
Fourth-seeded Castleton University batted around in the top of the first inning and scored four runs on four hits and two walks and went on to an 11-1, five-inning decision that eliminated fifth-seeded Rhode Island College from the 2023 Little East Conference softball tournament Friday afternoon and kept the Spartans' championship hopes alive at Clyde Washburne Field. 

The win was the second in the tournament for Castleton (20-15) over Rhode Island College (19-19) and moves it into another eliminated game Friday evening at 6 p.m. against second-seeded University of Massachusetts Dartmouth (27-12). UMass dropped into an elimination game earlier Friday in a 7-3 loss to top-seeded Eastern Connecticut State University in the second game for each of those teams. Castleton had opened the tournament with a 2-0 victory over Rhode Island. 
 
Friday, Olivia Joy (9-6) faced only three batters over the minimum in the five-inning win over Rhode Island in her route-going performance. Joy did not allow a hit over the first three innings and finished with a two-hitter with two strikeouts and no walks. 
 
The top seven hitters in the Castleton order each had at least two hits and each scored at least run off three Rhode Island pitches, with starter Abby Kidd (13-9) leaving after giving up a leadoff triple to Hannah Mosher and a walk to Kate LaPan. Both came around to score, as did No. 3 hitter Samera Rideout, who reached on an infield single off new pitcher Gabby Cunha. 
 
Rideout and Allie Almond each had three hits and combined to score five runs. Miranda Fish drove in three runs with a ground ball in the first inning, double in the fourth and infield single in the fifth. Both of Mosher's hits were doubles, leading off the game and driving in a run in the third. 
 
After losing its opener to Castleton Wednesday, Rhode Island shut out sixth-seeded UMass Boston, 3-0, later that night and followed Thursday with a walk-off, ten-inning win that eliminated third-seeded University of Southern Maine to remain alive Friday. 

No. 2 UMass Dartmouth 10, No. 4 Castleton 1 
Second-seeded University of Massachusetts Dartmouth advanced to the championship round of the Little East Conference softball tournament for the second year in a row after collecting 14 hits in a 10-1 win over fourth-seeded Castleton University in an elimination game on the third day of the tournament Friday evening at Clyde Washburne Field.

UMass Dartmouth (28-12) remained alive to advance after losing the winners' bracket final earlier in the day to top-seeded and three-time defending champion Eastern Connecticut State University, 7-3. The Corsairs will need to defeat unbeaten Eastern (28-8) twice beginning at noon to capture its first LEC tournament title. It will be the second trip to the championship round for UMass, looking for its first title. Eastern has won 20 straight and is 12-0 at home this year. 

Castleton (20-16), which eliminated fifth-seeded Rhode Island College with a 16-hit attack earlier Friday that kept it alive, had no answers against UMD's Jill Richards (13-7), who spun a complete-game five-hitter  with four strikeouts. Richards walked five but didn't allow more than a hit in an inning until the sixth, at which time the game was well in hand. 

The Corsairs compiled 14 hits – half of them for extra bases – against five Castleton pitchers and were the recipients of four Spartan errors. Dyonna Rodas, Larissa Piessens and Sydney Menz all drove in two runs for the Corsairs, with Rodas and Piessens both contributing three hits. Piessens (leadoff) and Lindsay Chubbuck both hit solo home runs to stake the Corsairs to a 2-0 lead in the second inning and a bases loaded walk to Richards made it 3-0 later in the inning and chased Castleton freshman starter Lauren Ross (3-2). As a team, UMass strung together multiple hits in five of its seven at-bats. 

Eastern edged UMass Dartmouth twice by a run in low-scoring games in the regular-season doubleheader at Washburne Field. In Friday's winners' bracket final, Eastern's Carley Stoker took a no-hitter into the seventh, eventually allowing three infield singles and three unearned runs in a 7-3 win. The victory over UMass was Eastern's 13th straight over a four-year period in LEC tournament competition.