Thursday, May 5, 2022

ELLENSBURG, Wash. – Malia Pinder drew a bases-loaded walk in the ninth inning to drive home Megan Convery, lifting No. 2 Saint Martin’s over the third-seeded Western Washington Vikings in the opening game of the GNAC Championships.

The Saints will advance to play the winner of Northwest Nazarene and Central Washington on Friday at 12:30 p.m. The Vikings saw their six-game GNAC Championships win streak snapped, a run that spanned WWU’s tournament titles in 2017 and 2021, and will play the loser of the NNU/CWU game at 10 a.m. on Friday.

After the GNAC Championships were moved from Lacey to Ellensburg and delayed four hours Thursday due to rain, the two squads finally got on the field and delivered a back-and-forth game that was well worth the wait. Western Washington’s Dakota Brooks started the game off with a bang, homering with two outs in the top of the first inning, but the Saints answered quickly against Vikings starter Sydney Brown.

With two outs, Vanessa Smoke doubled down the right-field line, scoring Pinder and tying the ballgame. After a Kekai Schultz single, Conerly’s dribbler was thrown away by Brown, allowing both Smoke and Schultz to come around to score and giving the Saints a 3-1 lead. The Vikings tied the score in the top of the second inning when Lauren Lo, a .304 hitter with only one home run on the season entering the game, crushed a ball to straightaway center field for a two-run shot after Kinsey Williams reached on an error.

It seemed that a slugfest might be in the cards, but both teams made pitching changes that steadied the ship. Brown was pulled after one inning, but Kira Doan threw 7.1 innings of relief, allowing three runs on seven hits. After SMU starter Tia Ridings gave up four runs in 3.2 innings, Chloe Leverington pitched the rest of the way, giving up one run on six hits in 5.1 innings and eventually earning the win.

While the pace of the offense slowed down after the first two innings, there were still more twists and turns to follow. With Western Washington clinging to a 4-3 lead, the Saints seemingly took control of the game in the bottom of the sixth, once again doing damage with two outs. Conerly doubled home pinch-runner Jaeden Ells for her third hit of the night before a crisp two-hop single up the middle from Olivia Schmidt sent Conerly around to score and gave the Saints the lead.

The Vikings were unwilling to concede in regulation, however. After a Chantelle Shimabukuro double, left fielder Rylie Wales hit a sinking line drive that eluded a diving Saints outfielder, allowing Shimabukuro to score and Wales to scamper all the way to third with one out.

Leverington forced a pair of groundouts to hold the tying run at third base and keep the score tied until the ninth. Back-to-back singles from Convery and Shay Lopes set the stage for Kylee Vanderbout and Pinder to draw the fifth and sixth walks of the game for SMU to force in the winning run.