Graig MantleAfter splitting the first two games of a three-game series against Big West Conference rival UC Santa Barbara on Saturday, the Cal Poly softball team fell 6-5 Sunday after a late comeback pushed the game to nine innings at Bob Janssen Field.
“We definitely did not play our game,” Cal Poly shortstop Melissa Pura said. “We’re definitely better than that team.”
Cal Poly (34-14, 9-3 Big West) had a hard time hitting Gaucho pitcher Jennifer Davis, who ended the game with nine strikeouts, breaking the Big West record for career strikeouts with 801.
Before Sunday, former Cal Poly pitcher Desarie Knipfer held the record with 798 strikeouts in her career.
“She’s a good pitcher,” Cal Poly relief pitcher Emily Hively said. “We knew that going in, (Davis) was going to be tough to beat.”
After three scoreless innings, the Gauchos struck first in the fourth, rallying off a leadoff double by catcher Ericka Hansen to drive in three runs.
Cal Poly changed pitchers from Jenna Maiden to Hively in the fifth inning and the Gauchos’ first batter, Davis, hit a solo home run over the 220-foot marker in center field.
Cal Poly finally answered in the fifth, hitting three singles and scoring one run.
Then in the sixth, an error cost the Mustangs as it allowed a Gaucho runner to score.
With the score 4-1 UCSB, Cal Poly’s defense held the Gauchos in a three-up, three-down top of the seventh.
In the bottom of the seventh, Cal Poly rallied back.
The Mustangs’ first batter, catcher Jackie Gehrke-Jones, was hit by a pitch. The team then went on to score four runs on four hits. Pura hit a three-run double that tied the game and made her the Big West leader in doubles (18). The hit came after Pura slugged a foul ball to left field that just missed the pole and would have made for a walk-off home run.
Still tied in the eighth inning and facing two Gaucho base runners on first and second, Cal Poly center fielder Lisa Modglin fielded a ground ball and roped it to home plate where Gehrke-Jones, stretching out to make the catch, was mowed over by Gaucho catcher Adrienne Anderson.
Gehrke-Jones held onto the ball, getting the last out of the inning and keeping the game tied.
In the top of the ninth, UCSB scored on a single to center field by Hansen.
Unable to muster any offense in the bottom of the ninth, Cal Poly lost after three batters hit three consecutive infield groundouts.
Now in a three-way tie for first place, Cal Poly looks ahead to games at Cal State Fullerton and against visiting Pacific to close the season.
“Fullerton is going to be just as hard or harder,” Hively said.
Cal Poly head coach Jenny Condon remained optimistic about the final six regular-season games.
“We still control our own destiny,” she said.