BETHANY, Okla.—Southern Nazarene celebrated Senior Day on Saturday by honoring their six seniors; Madison Arnold, Caitlyn Curlee (Bates), Hailie Fellers, Jayme Hightower, Jennifer Romero-Ivarson, and Chelsea Vandiver, before closing out the regular season with a split with Ouachita Baptist, falling 9-8 in game one before a 5-1 win in game two.
Game 1:
After just a 3-2 game yesterday, the offenses broke out in the first game on Saturday with 17 runs on 25 combined hits. Most of the damage from both teams came in the second inning as they combined for 11 runs in that second frame.
Ouachita broke the game open in the second inning with a six spot, but quickly saw that lead dwindle as Southern Nazarene notched their own five-spot in the bottom half of the inning. SNU's runs came thanks in part to a string of four straight hits from Natalie Jones, Caitlyn Curlee (Bates), Emma Swearingen, and Hailie Fellers. The inning was kickstarted by Sydney Sundbye's single and stolen base. Sundbye finished the game 3-for-4 with 3 runs scored.
The Storm tied the game at 6 the following inning on Natalie Jones' RBI single. Jones was the other SNU batter with three hits. She also drove home three runs in the game.
After Ouachita retook the lead with a run in the fifth inning, Southern Nazarene again responded with a pair of runs in the bottom of the inning to take their first lead of the game. Brooklyn Sullivan drove Sundbye home to tie the game. Sullivan then came around to score the go-ahead run on another Natalie Jones RBI single.
After holding Ouachita scoreless in the sixth and finding themselves just three outs away from another win, SNU was unable to hold the lead as Ouachita loaded the bases with just one out in the inning. Two runners came around to score on a two-run double, once again giving Ouachita the advantage. The damage could have been worse, though, if not for a great play in right field by senior, Hailie Fellers, who caught what appeared to be a sacrifice fly, but came up firing and threw a beautiful strike to Liana Heshiki at the plate to gun down the runner and keep the deficit at just one run.
Unfortunately for the Storm, the one run deficit was still too much to overcome as they went down 1-2-3 in the bottom of the seventh to ultimately fall 9-8 to the Tigers in the first game of the day.
Game 2:
Game two was much more kind to the Crimson Storm, who jumped on Ouachita with three runs in the first inning and cruised to a 5-1 win to take the series two games to one.
Southern Nazarene's three run first inning came on four hits, including an RBI single from Emma Swearingen and a two-RBI single from Hailie Fellers. The Storm continued to tack on the runs with a run in the second after a Caitlyn Curlee (Bates) RBI single. She went out in style in her final home game with SNU, finishing 3-for-4 with 2 RBIs. She is up to 172 RBIs for her career, good for third all-time at Southern Nazarene.
From there, the scoring slowed down. Ouachita took one run back in the third inning, but that was all they could muster for the entire game as Jennifer Romero-Ivarson pitched a gem in her final home game, allowing just 3 hits and striking out 4 batters on the way to her 16th win of the season.
The Storm notched one more insurance in the fourth inning on another Curlee RBI single.
SNU finished the game in style with a rare 6-3-5 double play as a groundout to shortstop turned into a double-play when the runner on second attempted to advance to third base. She was gunned down, though, after a strong throw across the diamond from Emma Swearingen to Hailey Evans.
With the split, and a pair of Southeastern Oklahoma State losses on Saturday, SNU officially clinches the No. 4 seed in the Great American Conference tournament. It is the highest seed they have ever earned at the GAC tournament. They will meet up with Oklahoma Baptist in the first round. SNU won 2 of 3 over the Bison this season. Both wins were 1-0 victories that included Jennifer Romero-Ivarson complete games, and Anna Icenhower solo home runs. The GAC tournament is set to be held this Thursday-Saturday, May 5-7. The tournament schedule is still TBD at this time.
