Schaefer lifts Texans to second straight walk-off, series win over CBU

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STEPHENVILLE – A second consecutive walk-off victory – this one from Katy Schaefer in the more traditional style – lifted Tarleton to a 3-2 win in the series finale against California Baptist Saturday afternoon.

This marks Tarleton’s first-ever Western Athletic Conference series win and brings the Texans to 3-3 in WAC play through the first two conference weekends.

In a rematch of yesterday’s pitcher’s duel between Kerisa Viramontes and Tristan Bridges, the first three innings proved to be more of the same as the Texans and Lancers were deadlocked at 0-0 until the fourth.

CBU threatened in the top of the fourth with a one-out error, but Jordan Dickerson and Morgan Medford kept the Lancers at bay with a 4-6-3 double play to end the threat. In the bottom half of the inning, Tarleton struck for their first runs of the weekend against the CBU right-hander when Mackenzie Peterson ripped a two-out, two-run double down the left-field line to plat Dickerson and Medford for a 2-0 Texan lead.

The Lancers got two back on a two-out, bloop base hit behind second base to tie things up. The pitchers went back to their dominant ways over the next two innings to carry the tie game into the bottom of the seventh.

The game appeared primed for extra innings after back-to-back strikeouts led off the bottom of the seventh, but Georgia Capell singled off the third base bag to spark the seventh-inning rally. Bailee Riggs followed up with a sharp, slapped single through the left side.

Medford put together one of the toughest at bats of the afternoon. The round-two freshman shortstop fell behind 0-2 in the count on three straight foul balls to start and ultimately worked a nine-pitch walk to load the bases for Schaefer, who only needed to see two pitches before walking Tarleton off a winner with an RBI single to left.

Riggs tied a career high with her second three-hit game of the season, going 3-4 at the dish. Capell also had a two-hit performance while Medford, Schaefer, Dickerson and Peterson had one hit each to round out the Tarleton offense.

Bridges was spectacular once again. The sophomore southpaw twirled a complete game victory, allowing two runs on four hits while striking out one. For the weekend, Bridges appeared in all three games against the Lancers and was responsible for all three decisions. She went 2-1 for the series with 15.1 innings of work, allowing only three earned runs for a 1.57 ERA. She held the Lancers to a mere .125 batting average.

Tarleton will head west next weekend for a three-game series against New Mexico State in Las Cruces, beginning with a Friday doubleheader at 3 p.m.

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