Lady Demons cruise to pair of wins at HBU

HOUSTON – Northwestern State scored in its first at bats of both games on Friday leading to 5-1 and 10-2 wins against Houston Baptist on opening day of Southland Conference play.

The Lady Demon (19-12, 2-0) offense provided the early run support for a pair of dominant pitching performances from Sage Hoover (6-3) and Maggie Darr (8-2) who combined to allow just two earned runs on the day.

“This is the first conference game on the road for a lot of these players so for them to come out and get those early leads made things a lot more manageable,” head coach Donald Pickett said. “We were able to get some good pitching and made some good plays. They’re (HBU) a pretty good offensive team and it was really good for us to keep scoring throughout the game and finish them out.”

The Lady Demons got the first-inning support on some two-out magic from the RBI machine that currently is Keely DuBois. A base hit to left allowed Taylor Williams, who reached on a walk and moved to second on an infield single from Makenzie Chaffin.

NSU picked up the early lead and turned the ball over to freshman Sage Hoover, who matched her dominant first career start from mid-February in her first conference start.

Hoover struck out the side in the bottom of the first, the first three of her career-high 14 strikeouts on the day, matching the number that Maggie Darr, the game two starter, put up earlier this season as the most by an NSU pitcher in more than 10 years.

The striking out of the side was just the beginning of the dominant outing from Hoover. She sat down the first 13 batters she faced in a row, including striking out the side again in the third inning. HBU didn’t get their first baserunner until an error on a grounder back to the circle with one out in the fifth.

“I was using my rise ball and changeup really well and going at them as best I could,” Hoover said. “I went in knowing I wanted to get my walks down and had to be more effective in the zone and that’s what I tried to do today.

Hoover got the next two batters, one on a spectacular diving grab by Williams at second and finished the first five innings without allowing a hit.

The game within the game in the conference opener was the matchup between Hoover, the conference leader in strikeouts and HBU leadoff batter Shelby Echols who entered the game with the fourth best batting average in the country and the SLC leader in hits.

Hoover won the first two battles with Echols, getting her to strikeout on three pitches in her first at bat and painting the inside corner with a change up in the fourth for another K. Echols however won the final engagement and broke up the no-hitter with a single over the head of DuBois a short with two outs in the sixth.

“It was challenging,” Hoover said. “She’s a good player and has done great this year but I was excited to face off against her. She did good, I did good. It was a fun battle.”

NSU had a 2-0 by that point after adding a run on a wild pitch in the top of the inning and bookended Hoover’s outing with three more runs in the seventh.

After getting the first two batters of the inning to reach for the third time in the game, DuBois worked her RBI magic again with a no-doubt home run to left field giving NSU a 5-0 lead. The four RBI game was the third in the past five games for DuBois.

The only blemish against Hoover came in the bottom of the seventh after she hit the first two batters and walked the third, leading to a sacrifice fly and the only run of the game for the Huskies.

The bulk of the scoring for the Lady Demons in the second game came in the a six-run first inning.

Two hits and one of four HBU errors in the inning loaded the bases after the first three batters of the game. Chaffin singled to left for the first run and DuBois added another on a sacrifice fly to center. The next two runs came in as two pitches sailed over the catcher to the backstop allowing Laney Roos and Chaffin to score.

Derika Castillo drove a ball down the third base line with two outs later in the inning for the big hit of the opening frame that put the Lady Demons up 6-0. The six runs in the first was plenty of support for Darr who threw her fourth complete game of the season scattering six hits over the seven innings with five strikeouts.

Up 6-1 after the second, Tristin Court added to the lead with a solo home run to start the third inning and Williams made it an 8-1 game on a base hit to right center three batters later.

“If we can score five or more runs I think we’re going to win a lot of games,”. “They helped us out a little in the second game, but we put the ball in play and they made some mistakes and good teams should take advantage of them and we did. We’re starting to pick up one through nine and getting more consistent up and down the lineup and hopefully we’ll be able to continue that.”

Court added another RBI in the sixth on a liner to center giving the Lady Demons the chance for their second run-rule win in as many weeks going into the bottom of the inning.

With two outs and a runner at second, a high fly ball fell just out of the reach of a diving Ragsdale in shallow center allowing the game-extending run to score. The Lady Demon got the run back in the next inning on a Roos groundout, scoring Williams who doubled to left earlier in the inning.

Five different players had two hits in the game and eight different players scored a run in the nightcap as the Lady Demons reached double figures for the first time on the season.

“We didn’t finish either game like I would have liked to but Sage was dominant in that first game and Maggie did what she needed to do after we got that lead in the first,” Pickett said. “It was big for both of them to be able to pitch the whole game so we didn’t have to show our other pitchers going into tomorrow. Just really proud of what Sage and Maggie did out there today.”

NSU and HBU close the series on Sunday afternoon at 12 p.m. from Husky Field. The game can be seen on ESPN+.