Concordia (23-25, 9-7 nsic) suffered a pair of close losses to the top team in the nsic, southwest minnesota state (31-8, 16-0) in marshall, falling 2-0 and 4-3 in ten innings. The mustangs clinched the nsic regular-season title and the right to host the tournament next week with the win and have won 30 straight regular-season games against nsic opponents.
in game one, the mustangs scored the first run of the game when leadoff batter jessica paczosa doubled up the middle and advanced to third and evntually home on a pair of fly balls to the outfield. Sw minnesota state would add an insurance run to take a 2-0 lead in the fifth inning.
concordia threated when
amanda yurek led off the seventh inning with a single to center and advanced to third on a one-out double to right by
mallory olson. With runners on second and third, the bears failed to capitalize as
tiffany rodd struck out and
nikki scherr flew out to the third baseman in foul territory to end the game.
the bears managed just four hits off the nsic leading pitcher amanda johnson, who improved to 21-3 on the year.
mandy turba (12-15)took the loss for the bears, despite pitching a solid game allowing five hits and only two earned runs.
the second game of the day began much like the first, with smsu jumping out to a 1-0 lead on a double by leadoff batter pacsoza. She would score three batters later on a double by amanda tucci.
the bears answered back in the top of the second inning on a one-out walk by m. Olson. She advanced to second on a mustang error and scored on an rbi single by scherr that got through the right side.
southwest minnesota put two more runs on the board in the fourth inning to take a 3-1 lead. In the top of the fifth,
anna bjorlin put the ball in play and reached on an error by the mustang shortstop. With the bears down two, senior
amanda yurek hit her first home run of the season and 19th of her career to tie the game.
neither team would score in the next three innings, putting the international tie-breaker rule into effect in the tenth, where a runner is placed on second to start the inning.
with melissa bergdall placed at second for the bears, concordia failed to advance her past second. The mustangs placed jessica donoho on second in their half of the tenth inning and pacsoza damaged the bears again as she hit her second double of the game and third of the day to score donoho and give smsu their eighth nsic regular-season title.
turba (12-16) took the loss after replacing
jenny kaminski in the seventh inning. Turba allowed just one hit, the game winner, in three innings of work, while kaminksi allowed three earned runs on ten hits. Johnson picked up her 22 win of the year.
for the game, the bears scored three runs on four hits and left five runners on base, while the mustangs put up four runs on 11 hits and left seven runners on base.
concordia will return to action on saturday and sunday at the msu mankato tournament.
sw minnesota st. 2, cu 0sw minnesota st. 4, cu 3
