PALO ALTO, Calif. – Down two runs in the sixth inning, the Arizona softball team fought back with a Lauren Young three-run homer followed by a Hallie Wilson solo shot in the seventh to pull out a 5-3 victory over No. 13 Stanford in the opener of a three-game series.
UA (31-23, 8-14 Pac-12), which rallied for wins last weekend after trailing by eight runs on Friday and four runs on Saturday against Arizona State, followed a familiar script. In their last four games, the Cats have scored 14 runs in the final two offensive innings. In its previous three games (April 26-28 at Oregon State), Arizona scored a total of three runs.
UA trailed the entire game before coming to bat in the top of the sixth. Wilson walked and, with help from a throwing error, moved to third on Chelsea Suitos’ infield single. Young followed with monster home run to the deepest part of the park, a no-doubter that brought Arizona from two runs down to a run ahead.
Starter Shelby Babcock allowed three runs, two earned, on seven hits. The junior struck out four and walked four in 4 2/3 innings
pitched. Estela Piñon (11-8) pitched the final 2 1/3 innings and allowed just one hit while striking out six batters.
Teagan Gerhart (19-10) allowed five runs, four earned, on seven hits with three strikeouts and a walk for Stanford.
Suitos singled twice and scored the game’s tying run on Young’s homer. Young’s home run was her 12th of the season; Wilson blasted her seventh of the year in the seventh.
Stanford (36-18, 12-10 Pac-12) left 13 batters on base; Arizona stranded just three.
The Cardinal plated a pair in the third inning thanks to a Wildcat error. Two infield singles and a walk loaded the bases with no one out. After Babcock struck Leah White out, Kayla Bonstrom hit a grounder to short, where Brigette Del Ponte booted it to allow a run to score. A sacrifice fly, which would have been the third out, off the bat of Jenna Rich plated a second Stanford run to make it 2-0.
Chelsea Suitos led the top of the fourth inning with a single down the left-field line and moved to second on a Chelsea Goodacre groundout. After a dropped foul by catcher Jessica Plaza, Kelsey Rodriguez singled home Suitos to cut the deficit to 2-1.
Stanford, which loaded the bases in the third, fourth, fifth and seventh innings, added to its lead by putting together a two-out rally in the fifth. Babcock retired the first two batters before allowing back-to-back hits, the latter of which, an RBI double from Erin Ashby, made it 3-1 Stanford. A walk chased Babcock in favor of Piñon, who struck out the next batter she faced, but a passed ball loaded the bases. Piñon struck out the next batter as well to escape the bases-full jam.
UA responded in the bottom of the inning with Young’s homer.
In the bottom of the sixth, Bonstrom hit a two-out double but was stranded when Piñon struck out Rich.
The Cardinal loaded the bases without a hit in the bottom of the seventh inning after Wilson had given the Wildcats an insurance run with her solo shot in the top of the frame. A leadoff hit-by-pitch followed by an error put the tying runs on with no one out. Piñon retired the next two batters before hitting the second batter of the inning to load the bases. The junior then struck out Hanna Winter to end the game.
