11 hours Ago
The historic season continues. Entering their first ever ACC tournament, the Stanford Cardinal (40-10, 16-8 ACC) faced a tough test against 12 seeded Pittsburgh but were able to come away with the win, beating the Panthers 9-2 to advance to the quarterfinals. Coming in as the No.
5 seed, the Cardinal narrowly missed out on a first round bye, but took full advantage of round one to gain momentum. Pittsburgh took an early 1-0 lead in the top of the first inning via an RBI single, but it did not take long for the Cardinal to respond, with Jade Berry hitting an RBI single to tie the game up at 1-1 in the bottom of the first inning. In the top of the second, the Panthers took a 2-1 lead on an error by Stanford first baseman, Joie Economides.
However, from then on, Stanford took over the game and never looked back. After Allie Clements hit a two-run home run in the bottom of the second to give the Cardinal a new 3-2 lead, momentum shifted completely, with the Cardinal scoring six more unanswered runs. In the third inning, Kyra Chan hit a single to right field that brought in River Mahler, making it 4-2 Cardinal.
Later on in the inning, Caelan Koch delivered her first two RBI, scoring both Chan and Berry to extend the Cardinal lead to 6-2. Then came Kylie Chung, who hit a two RBI single that scored Dani Hayes and Economides, making it an 8-2 game in favor of Stanford and putting things out of reach. A couple innings of good pitching and defense held steady things, until the fifth inning when Koch reached base on a fielder's choice, allowing Berry to score and giving Stanford the 9-2 lead.
Chung got the start for the Cardinal and got the win, allowing two runs (one earned) on six hits, four walks and three strikeouts in four innings of work. Zoe Prystajko and Alyssa Houston also made appearances in the game, with Prystajko pitching 2.2 innings of clean softball and Houston pitching 0.
1 innings. With the win, the Cardinal will face a quick turnaround and take on No. 4 seed Duke tomorrow.
First pitch will be at 10:30 a.m. (PT) and will air on the ACC Network.
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