University of Louisiana at Lafayette Athletics
Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns
South Carolina
Seventh-Inning Heroics Lift Cajuns Past South Carolina in NCAA Regional Opener
5/20/2005 12:00:00 AM | Softball
Thursday, May 20, 2004
Mitchell (42-3), who picked up her 20th consecutive victory, struck out eight Gamecock batters and tossed a complete-game, one-hit shutout while Danyele Gomez brought home the winning run with a two-out RBI double in the top of the seventh.
The offense put together seven hits as the ninth-ranked Cajuns pushed their win streak to 15 games and moved within one win of tying the program record for wins.
For Mitchell it was her 12th solo shutout of the season as she extended her streak of consecutive innings without an earned run allowed to 25 2/3 innings. The Pasadena, Texas, native collected her fourth career NCAA Regional shutout.
Gomez,
who scored Holly Tankersley for her 48th RBI of the
season, joined Ashley Evans with a team-high two hits.
Gomez was 2-for-4 while Evans followed with a 2-for-3
performance. A total of five players combined for the
seven hits.
“Obviously, it was a team effort,” said Louisiana-Lafayette head coach Stefni Lotief. “It took a while for us to get going, but it's always a good feeling to get the first game under your belt and more importantly with a win.”
"With Brooke (Mitchell) on the mound, we can beat anyone in the country,” Lotief remarked in response to a question regarding the Cajuns No. 5 seed in the regional tournament. “Our mindset is to come here and compete – we'll roll with it from here and take what we can get.”
With the win, Louisiana-Lafayette advances into the winner's bracket semifinals to face the winner of the Arizona-Centenary matchup Friday at 4 p.m. (CDT) here at University of Arizona's Hillenbrand Stadium.
Mitchell
and South Carolina's Stacey Johnson (16-13) were
deadlocked into a pitcher's duel heading into the
seventh. Mitchell's lone hit allowed came in the second
inning while Johnson had fanned eight Cajun hitters
through six complete.
Both defenses had come up with spectacular plays in the earlier innings to avert the one good scoring chance the opposition had.
South Carolina had a first-and-third situation with no outs in the fourth inning after a throwing error by Gomez on a sacrifice bunt allowed McKenna Hughes to reach base. Mitchell calmly collected herself and induced a grounder to Ashley Evans at first base and then back-to-back fly outs to Crystal George in left field.
“I think Brooke went out there aggressively,” Lotief said. “She worked on her pitches and did a good job of mixing it up. Her strikeout numbers may not have been very high, but she knows she can trust her defense to make the plays behind her.”
UL Lafayette's best scoring chance, prior to Gomez's game-winning double, came in the sixth inning when back-to-back one-out singles from Evans and Joy Webre put a runner in scoring position. Johnson countered by getting a grounder to third base from Lacey Bertucci and struck out Leslie Pierce to end the threat.
Mitchell
retired the Gamecocks in order in the sixth to set the
stage for the seventh-inning heroics.
After seeing stellar defensive plays dominate through the first six innings it seemed as though one blink by either team would end the game.
South Carolina would be the one to blink first – with two outs in the top of the seventh inning.
After Tankersley drew a two-out walk, Gomez looped a hit into shallow left center field that appeared as though it would be caught. However, USC's Hughes pulled up too far when charging for the ball and it sailed over her reach and deep into the gap.
Tankersley motored around the base path for her 59th run of the season to give Louisiana-Lafayette a 1-0 lead.
Gomez's double was the Cajuns fifth two-out hit of the contest, but this time was the most important.
“It
was a good situation for me to have one person on base
and a chance to score,” Gomez said. “I didn't know if it
would drop, but when I saw Holly (Tankersley) running, I
knew we'd score.”
Mitchell struck out the final two USC hitters, getting Aleca Johnson looking at the final strike of the contest to wrap up her fifth complete-game, one-hitter of the season.
“It worked out for us,” Mitchell said. “We just took it one pitch at a time. We knew that we were going to get it done.”
Louisiana-Lafayette improved to 10-4 all-time in regional openers with the victory and advanced into the winner's bracket for the second straight season setting up a possible showdown with top-ranked and host-Arizona.
Louisiana-Lafayette 1, South
Carolina 0
(May 20, 2004 at Tucson, Ariz.)
--------------------------------------------------------------Louisiana-Lafayette.
000 000 1 - 1 7 2 (56-6)
South Carolina...... 000 000 0 - 0 1 0 (27-23)
---------------------------------------------------------------Pitchers:
Louisiana-Lafayette - Mitchell. South Carolina -
Johnson, S..
Win-Mitchell(42-3) Loss-Johnson, S.(16-13) T-2:02
GAME NOTES:
*Brooke Mitchell's 20th consecutive victory and 12th
solo shutout of the season
*Cajuns 15th straight win and second straight in a NCAA
Regional opener
*Danyele Gomez tied Holly Tankersley with her 48th RBI
of the season while Tankersley tied Becky McMurtry for
5th on the single-season charts with her 59th run scored
*UL Lafayette improves to 8-5 in regional play under
head coach Stefni Lotief and 27-19 all-time.
*Brooke Mitchell has not allowed an earned run in 25 2/3
consecutive innings and has gone 25 1/3 postseason
innings (Sun Belt Tournament and NCAA Tournament)
without an earned run allowed and just six hits
surrendered.
*Cajuns will face the Arizona-Centenary winner at 4 p.m.
(CDT) Friday in a winner's bracket semifinals game
-- Ragin' Cajuns --
