Houston, Texas - Oklahoma Christian swept the final day of the DII Spring Invitational with wins over Cal Poly Humboldt and Metro State to go 5-1 on the weekend with two top-25 wins.
Game 1: OC 6, HUM 3
The Lumberjacks struck first, scoring two runs in the top of the first off
Jill Dickson before
Karsyn Iltis shut down Humboldt's offense.
The lead didn't last long as Oklahoma Christian opened the bottom half of the inning with three-straight singles from
Hannah Pate,
Kristen Whitehouse, and
Whitney Walde added an RBI to her single, scoring Pate. Pate also had a stolen base during that stretch. And
Aaliyah Brown gave the Eagles the lead with a two-run triple, bringing home Whitehouse and Walde.
Rebeca Fajardo continued her stellar weekend at the plate with a single down the right-field line that scored Brown and gave OC a 2-run lead.
The following three frames were scoreless before each team scored in the 6, with the
Kelsey Gammage scoring for the Eagles on a wild pitch.
Oklahoma Christian brought
Jill Dickson back into the game in the top of the 6th, and she shut down the Lumberjacks the rest of the way. The Eagles scored their final run of the game on an
Aaliyah Brown sacrifice fly.
Game 2: OC 6, MSU 0
Payton Foster spun another gem to go 3-0 on the weekend with wins over No. 13 Augustana and No. 8 Central Oklahoma. In today's game, Foster only allowed three hits and struck out 8 Roadrunners.
The Eagles' runs came in the 4th and 5th inning, as the first three innings were a pitcher's duel.
Marissa Powell, a freshman from Aledo, Texas, opened the scoring for OC with an RBI single. Karysyn Iltis followed that in a pinch-hit at-bat that scored Powell and
Kiley Brewster, who reached first on a single earlier in the inning.
Whitney Walde led off the 5th inning with a walk, advanced to second on a ground out, and made it to third on a passed ball. Rebeca Farjado brought Walde home on an RBI double, and then
Kylie Janzen scored on a fielder's choice RBI from
Chloe Woodward to make it 5-0. And to close out the day,
Tristyn Hamilton brought
Kiley Brewster home with an infield RBI single.
COACH RODRIGUEZ'S THOUGHTS
It was great to come out and finish the weekend with two good wins today. Our pitchers stepped up and carried the load this weekend, having a key piece of our staff missing. We will be hard to beat if they continue to step up as they did! Our offense finally got into a rhythm today and executed well at the plate. Pinch hitters came in and had some big RBIs for us. All around we had a great weekend and got the season off to a great start.
NEXT UP
The Eagles will open Lone Star Conference play at Western New Mexico, beginning the series on Friday at 12 PM
