April 19, 2011

Box Score

Stockton, Calif. - Finishing their non-conference regular season schedule on Tuesday, April 19, the Pacific softball team suffered a tough 6-1 loss to the No. 10 ranked Stanford Cardinal at Bill Simoni Field. The loss for Pacific dropped their record to 27-15 overall while the Cardinal improved to 31-8.

With a chance to knock off another top-10 team at home, the Tigers struggled to give themselves a chance against the No. 10 ranked team in the nation as Pacific fell behind early and could never recover. A two-out error by Pacific handed the Cardinal their first run of the game and breathed life into an otherwise dead inning. With the extra out, Michelle Prong made the Tigers pay for two more runs with a single to right to post three runs on the board before Pacific could get to the plate.

An inning later, Stanford struck for two more runs, the first coming on a solo home run to left by Jenna Becerra as the Cardinal third baseman picked up her first long ball of the 2011 season. A sacrifice fly would plate a second run later in the inning as the Cardinal took a five run lead through just two innings.

In the third, the Cardinal plated a sixth and final run, once again taking full advantage of a Tiger error to tack on another unearned run.

Up big with their ace in the circle, the Cardinal held the Tigers in check for most of the contest as Teagan Gerhart was able to squelch a first inning scoring opportunity before relinquishing a single run in the fourth. Leading off the inning for the Tigers, freshman Megan Foglesong laced a single back up the middle to give Pacific just its second hit of the evening. Following suit, junior Nicole Matson ripped a double to left-center that put runners at second and third with no outs in the inning. After seeing two opportunities pass with nothing to show on the board, junior Alexa Rivera gave the Tigers their first run of the game with a bloop single down the left field line to plate Foglesong. The run was the freshman's 33rd of the season, moving her one past Matson for the conference's lead.

Pacific's run in the fourth would be its lone run of the game as the Tigers attempt at a rally in the bottom of the seventh was cut short on a controversial game-ending double play. The out recorded at first wiped a run off the board as Pacific fell by the final score of 6-1.

Overall, Pacific posted six hits in the game with six different Tigers recording one hit. The Stanford ace, Gerhart, improved to 17-6 on the year as she went 6.0 innings while giving up four of Pacific's six hits while striking out eight and walking one. On the other side, sophomore Nikki Armagost saw her five game winning streak in the circle come to an end as she threw six innings in the loss to fall to 13-9. The sophomore gave up five of Stanford's six hits while being charged with six runs, only two of which were earned. She struck out five and walked three while hitting two more.

The Tigers will begin the home stretch of the 2011 regular season when they host UC Riverside in a Big West double header on Friday, April 22 at Bill Simoni Field. Due to class schedules, the Friday games will begin an hour later than normal as the first game is scheduled for 1:00 pm.