GCU Moves on to Championship Sunday With Wins over Chico State, Sonoma State

Saturday, May 5

Carson, CA

1:30 p.m.

Grand Canyon

Chico State

Kayla Henry slides in safely and scores the first run of the game in GCU's 2-1 victory over Chico State.

GCU Moves on to Championship Sunday With Wins over Chico State, Sonoma State

5/5/2012 3:23:00 PM | Softball

Grand Canyon (36-20) stayed alive in the NCAA West I Softball Regional with a pair of one-run wins at Toro Diamond in Carson, Calif., Saturday.

GCU won the first of two elimination games with a 2-1 victory over Chico State and advanced to Championship Sunday with a 1-0 victory against Sonoma State.

GCU will play CSU Dominguez Hills at noon and will need to defeat the Toros twice to advance to next weekend’s Super Regional. If a second game is needed, it will be played at 2:30 p.m. Fans unable to make the trip to Carson can follow with live stats and live audio. Links to the live coverage are available at www.GCULopes.com.

GCU lost its opening game of the tournament to Dominguez Hills 1-0 Friday.

"They're a very good team," said GCU head coach Ann Pierson of the 10th-ranked Toros. "We're going to keep the same excitement and philopsophy and put our best foot forward and see how it shakes out."

That excitement and philosophy paid huge dividends Saturday. GCU won its first-ever NCAA tournament softball games in the program's brief nine-year history. In 2010, the Antelopes lost a pair of one-run games to Chico State and Dixie State and were quickly eliminated.

GCU has played three more one-run games in this year's tournament, but have been on the winning side of the last two.

"I told the kids how much this means to our program for them to have this kind of experience," Pierson said. "I'm very proud of them. This was a huge day for us and we're going to enjoy it and then start getting ready for Dominguez Hills."

Against Chico State trailing 1-0, Grand Canyon scored its first run of the tournament in the fifth inning. With one out, Kayla Henry and Haley Walker hit back-to-back infield singles. Stephanie Smith followed with a chopper to second, but Chico State first baseman Rachel Failla dropped the throw from second baseman Diana Payan and Henry came all the way around to score to tie the game 1-1.

Walker and Smith each moved up on a wild pitch and Walker scored when Kara Holtorf hit an infield single to give GCU the lead, 2-1.

"We've talked about how good all the teams are here and all of them can catch fly balls," said Pierson. "When you hit the ball on the ground you have a better chance of good things happening. We did that (in the fifth) and used our speed to get runs."

In relief, Kiki Sepulveda picked up the win. She threw three and two-thirds innings of shutout ball and gave up just two hits.

It was the start of another great day in the circle for the sophomore, who -- with her complete game shutout of Sonoma -- ran her streak of innings without giving up an earned run to 24.

"Kiki has been unbelievable," added Pierson. "The thing that has been amazing about her is she's not trying to strike people out. She's just trying to get ground balls and fly balls and get outs. She's doing that effectively with all of her pitches."

Sepulveda improved her record to 16-7.

Her defense came up clutch numerous times Saturday. In the second inning against Sonoma, a presumed singled to right field by Ali Palermo turned into a 9-to-3 putout when right fielder Henry hustled in to field the ground ball and throw to first baseman Lauren Regester for the out.

Sonoma had just five base runners in the game and only one through the first four innings. Only two got in scoring position and only one was in scoring position with less than two outs.

GCU solved Sonoma star pitcher Samantha Lipperd, who beat GCU 4-0 at the Tournament of Champions in late March. Lipperd fanned 16 in the win. She is the nation's leader in strikeouts with 396.

The Antelopes only struck out twice in Saturday's win.

"We had some really good at-bats against her and were able to put the ball in play," Pierson said. "She's a tremendous competitor and has really thrown a lot the last couple of month and we wanted to get people and for her to throw a lot of pitches."

The game’s lone run came in the second. Regester opened the inning with a double. She moved to second on a sacrifice bunt by Claire Zampini and scored on a sacrifice fly by Vanessa Chavez.

"That was a textbook offensive inning," described Pierson. "I thought there were some other opportunities where we could have blown it open and had good at-bats, but Lipperd is just very good."

GCU 2, CSU 1
GCU 1, SSU 0