BENTONVILLE, Ark. – Fourth seed Southern Nazarene won another close game against fifth seed Oklahoma Baptist (33-22) on Saturday, winning 1-0 in the Great American Conference Tournament at the Tiger Athletic Complex.
During the regular season, SNU had a pair of 1-0 wins before today's postseason result.
Remarkably, the Crimson Storm attained just three hits in the game.
That was due to another standout performance from
Kayleigh Jones and her defense. Jones tossed six frames, fanned eight and induced a combined 10 groundouts and flyouts. By game's end, OBU's All-GAC First-Team pitcher ran her season strikeout total to 304.
Jones is now one of only three GAC pitchers, the others are Arkansas Tech's Jalissa Gum (2017) and SNU's Kayla Wyatt (2016), to have amassed over 300 strikeouts in a season.
Today's game saw the green and gold have chances early on. A
Reagan Ford double and a
Jocee Sparks one-out walk in the first put two on. However, SNU pitcher Jennifer Romero quelled that threat with back-to-back fly ball outs to center.
A frame later, OBU once more got two one with one out after
Sheyanne Sandoval was walked. What followed was a Romero strikeout and groundout to short.
After that second inning, the Bison couldn't match those chances as they put just one base runner into scoring position over the next four frames.
In that time, the Storm found the game's lone run in the third. Following a wild pitch that sent pinch runner Noa Dodson to third base, a sacrifice fly to center by Caitlyn Curlee pushed her teammate across home.
Following that,
Aileen Avelar and Ford notched singles in the fourth and fifth frames, respectively, but unfortunately the Bison would not find the tying run. In the final two innings, Romero retired the side to preserve victory for the Storm.
The 33 wins attained this year by the Bison are the most they've registered in the D2 era.
