Sandoval's 2-hitter helps SOU sweep Saints
SOU Sports Information
ASHLAND – The defense behind Southern Oregon's ace was a touch better than Carroll's in a duel for the second day in a row, and the result was the completion of a crucial Cascade Conference series Saturday at University Field.
Gabby Sandoval's fourth shutout of the season, a two-hitter, enabled the No. 9-ranked Raiders to win 1-0 in Game 1, which was the third and final part of the CCC portion of the set. They clobbered the Saints 10-2 in a nonleague-counting finale that
Harlee Donovan ended with a two-run bomb that triggered the mercy rule in the fifth inning.
SOU (38-11 overall, 19-5 CCC) and No. 13 Corban are still tied for first place (though SOU owns the tiebreaker) going into their final series of the regular season next week. The Raiders will finish at Eastern Oregon, which Corban swept on Friday and Saturday, and Corban will head to Carroll (27-17, 13-11). Oregon Tech also kept pace with a weekend sweep and is lurking one game back.
In Game 1, SOU got an unearned across in the first inning against Saints starter Allison Williams, and Sandoval made it stand.
Kelsey Randall led off with a single, stole second base and moved to third on a misplayed grounder off
Harlee Donovan's bat. She scored on a
Rebecca Velasquez groundout with one out.
Sandoval (18-5) also defeated Williams (12-8) on Friday, 3-2 in eight innings, after the Raiders tied the game on an unearned run in the seventh. Sandoval was much sharper in her second start, however, and allowed two hits over a seven-inning game for just the second time in her career. She struck out three without issuing a walk and only got in trouble once: when Brittany Smith tripled and Natalie Gaber was hit by a pitch with two outs in the fifth. The threat ended, however, when Donovan caught Gaber's pinch-runner, TJ Rucker, trying to steal second.
Of Sandoval's 18 wins, seven have been decided by one run.
Game 2 was a different story. The Raiders scored six times in a first inning that unraveled due to two walks and a hit-batsman. Donvan hit an RBI single,
Paige Leeper stroked a two-run single with the bases loaded,
Hannah Wessel added an RBI double, and
Olivia Mackey put on the finishing touches with another two-run single.
Donovan, Mackey and Wessel had two hits apiece. Wessel added a two-run double in the fourth inning. In the fifth, Donovan sent her conference-leading eighth home run of the season over the left-field fence. She also extended her SOU-record streak of consecutive games on base to 30.