Recap: #8 Stanford SB rallies to beat #20 Oregon in Pac-12 Tournament
On Thursday, #8 Stanford softball came from behind to defeat #20 Oregon 4-3 in the quarterfinals of the inaugural Pac-12 Tournament. Stanford senior Alana Vawter (17-7) was the winning pitcher for the Cardinal while Oregon senior Morgan Scott (12-6) was the losing pitcher for the Ducks. Both pitchers pitched the entire game.
BOX SCORE: Oregon vs. Stanford (Pac-12 Tournament)-Thursday, May 11
Oregon jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the top of the 2nd inning. Terra McGowan got walked after which she got advanced to second base courtesy of a sacrifice bunt by Ariel Carlson. Up next to the plate would be Alyssa Daniell, who hit a two-run dinger to center field to bring home McGowan. Those would be the only runs Oregon scored in the inning.
The game stayed at 2-0 until Stanford finally answered in the bottom of the 6th. Now, Stanford did start to chip away a bit at the Ducks’ pitching prior to the 6th inning. Most notably in the bottom of the 5th. With one out, Emily Schultz singled through the left side. With two outs, Kylie Chung singled through the left side to advance Schultz to second base. River Mahler then got walked to load up the bases before Taylor Gindlesperger popped up to short stop to end the bottom of the 5th. While Stanford didn’t score, they finally started to get clicking offensively a bit and they did a great job of building on that in the next two innings.
After Oregon failed to score in the top of the 6th, Stanford scored two runs in the bottom of the inning to tie it up all with two outs after Allie Clements grounded into a double play. The first run the Cardinal scored came in the next at-bat as Emily Young went yard to left field, making it a 2-1 game. Kyra Chan then hit a single to the pitcher after which Emily Schultz hit a double to left field to bring home Chan. This tied the game up 2-2. Schultz was fired up after arriving safely on second base. The Cardinal now had some momentum. Thanks to a wild pitch, Schultz advanced to third base, but Sydney Steele flied out to right field to end the inning.
In the top of the 7th, Ariel Carlson singled to right center for the Ducks. With one out, Carlson stole second base after which Tehya Bird singled through the left side and advanced to second base thanks to a fielding error while Carlson came home to score. Oregon would not score any more runs the rest of the inning, but they at least had a 3-2 lead entering the bottom of the 7th. The pressure was now on Stanford.
In the bottom of the 7th, Chung crushed it deep over the right field fence to tie the game up for the Cardinal at 3-3. Mahler then singled to the pitcher to get on first base. Gindlesperger then executed a sacrifice bunt that went far better than Stanford could have expected. After Gindlesperger was out at first base, Mahler was able to round second base and advance to third base before Oregon committed a throwing error that caused the ball to go behind third base. Mahler read the situation correctly and sprinted home to score the game winning run with ease. 4-3 would be the final. The Cardinal escaped with a win.
For Stanford, this is a big-time win. Especially since they were coming off a rough weekend in which they got shut out twice at home against Washington. They were not at all happy with how that series went and rather than letting it affect their play in this game, they put it behind them and went to work. Stanford kept finding ways to dig deep and make winning plays with their backs against the wall.
Up next for Stanford is a Pac-12 Tournament semifinal game against #2 UCLA. That will be on Friday at 7:30 PM PT on ESPN2.
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