Rookie pitcher Miya Warner (11-4) has gotten into the habit of making the remarkable look routine. Take this week for example. She carried a perfect game into the sixth inning against visiting Little III rival Wesleyan University and a no-hitter into the fifth against Trinity College. What made the week memorable, however, wasn't the performances; it was the fact that she actually lost a game.

Against Trinity, for the first time in ten starts, Warner took a loss. The loss, however, did little to spoil a week in which the Jeffs went 3-1 and ran their NESCAC West Division record to 4-0. After Williams and Middlebury split a doubleheader, Amherst sits alone atop the NESCAC West.

In the opener against Wesleyan, the Jeffs defeated the Cardinals 3-0. Co-captain second baseman Emily Melia '03, who leads the team with 12 RBIs, staked Amherst to a 1-0 lead with a first inning RBI single. As it turned out, that was all Warner would need; she finished with eight strikeouts and no walks.

Warner was unhittable, losing her perfect game through five innings on a bloop single by her pitching counterpart, Lindsay Wasserman.

In the nightcap, Amherst's bats came alive. Propelled by 11 hits and a five-run fifth inning, the Jeffs won 7-2 and improved to 4-0 in conference play and 10-6 overall. First-year first baseman Laura Trigeiro was the catalyst for the Amherst offense, as her RBI double sparked the Jeffs' fifth inning flurry. Warner struggled uncharacteristically, allowing six hits and striking out five, but nonetheless claimed her eighth consecutive victory. She leads the NESCAC in six pitching categories and is second in another two.

Two days later, against NESCAC East rival Trinity, the Jeffs won the first game 6-2, thanks largely to an ugly first inning in which Trinity starter Kate Hunter walked five and hit one. When all was said and done, the Jeffs had scored four runs.

Warner never looked back. Matching her career high with 14 strikeouts, she blanked the Bantams for six innings, taking a no-hitter into the fifth.

The second half of the twin bill began inauspiciously. First baseman Maureen Heneghan led off the game with a single off Warner. She moved to second on a sacrifice bunt and scored on a double by designated player Laura Heath. (The designated player position is equivalent to the DH in baseball.) In the top of the fourth, the Jeffs yielded four runs because of porous defensive play. Trinity capitalized on Amherst's three errors to the tune of three unearned runs, punctuated by rookie left fielder Lindsey Freeman's two-run double. Amherst was simply unable to overcome their defensive mistakes.

The 6-2 loss, which left Amherst at 11-7 overall, "was a little bit of a letdown," according to senior co-captain and shortstop Missy Mordy, "but we know that it was not all that important in our season." Mordy pointed to this weekend's doubleheader at Middlebury and next weekend's sojourn to Williams as being particularly important. "If we sweep Middlebury, we're guaranteed a bid into the NESCAC tournament," she said. "Our season depends on the next two weekends."