LAKE CHARLES—McNeese softball advanced to the Southland Softball (Lake Charles Bracket) Championship game sponsored by Lake Charles Toyota with a 6-5 win over No. 3 seed Nicholls on Saturday. The No. 2 seed Cowgirls will face Nicholls at 1 p.m. Sunday for the right to advance to the Southland Conference Championship Series. The Cowgirls need one win over the Colonels to advance, and the Colonels must defeat the Cowgirls twice to advance to the Championship Series.
Should there be an (if necessary) game, that game will begin 30 minutes following the conclusion of game 1.
Nicholls defeated No. 7 seed Stephen F. Austin 11-1 to advance to the championship game.
McNeese (37-19) took a 6-1 lead after the third inning by scoring two runs in each of the first three innings. Nicholls scored its run in the second inning.
Nicholls (31-22) made things interesting by scoring two runs in the sixth and seventh innings to pull to within one run (6-5). McNeese made a pitching change that brought
Brookelyn Taylor in the game to replace
Maddie Taylor but after Brookelyn allowed one run on one hit in the seventh, Maddie was brought back in the game with two outs and the bases loaded. Maddie got Erin Krause to fly out to right to end the game.
McNeese collected nine hits in the game with
Kassidy Chance,
Jada Muñoz and
Onna Pruitt all picking up two hits apiece. Pruitt led the Cowgirls with two RBI in the game.
Maddie Taylor improved to 15-4 on the season with the win after allowing four runs on six hits with three strikeouts.
Molly Yoo fell to 17-11 overall after allowing four runs on five hits in 2.0 innings.
SCORING
B1- Cowgirls scored two runs on two hits on two two-out RBI singles by
Corine Poncho and Jada Munoz (McN 2, Nich 0)
T2- Nicholls got on the board with a solo homerun by Kayleigh Lugowski (McN 2, Nich 1)
B2- McNeese scored two runs on a single by
Kassidy Chance that scored
Onna Pruitt for a 3-1 lead. Mieko Dominguez also scored on a Colonel error (McN 4, Nich 1)
B3- Cowgirls added to their lead on a two out two RBI triple by Pruitt (McN 6, Nich 1)
T6- Nicholls cut the lead in half by scoring two runs in the sixth on two hits. Strum led the inning off with a single through the right side and scored on a Sisco doubled to left field. Sisco scored on a ground out. (McN 6, Nich 3)
T7- Nicholls made things interesting by pulling to within one run by scoring two runs in the inning with one run scoring on a Cowgirl error and the other on a sacrifice fly. (McN 6, Nich 5)
