PALM SPRINGS, Calif. – Anissa Young, Tammy Wray and Ashley Langoni connected for back-to-back-to-back home runs with two outs during the sixth inning to propel the No. 20 LSU softball team to a 6-2 victory over Fordham Saturday at the Big League Dreams Complex.
The Tigers (11-5) blasted all three of the long balls off Fordham hurler Jen Mineau, a 2010 NFCA All-American First-Team selection. Young finished with two home runs and four RBIs. It marked the 26th time a LSU player has garnered multiple homers in a game.
“Give the team credit for coming back after a game against Cal where they jumped all over us,” head coach Yvette Girouard said. “It could have easily been a 0-2 day, but we always say it takes just one swing of the bat to turn things into a positive. Anissa had a marvelous day, and we battled to get a win against a very good pitcher in Mineau.”
With LSU trailing a 2-1 in the sixth inning, Jacee Blades worked her way to an eight-pitch walk to snap a run of 13-straight batters retired by Mineau. Two batters later, Simone Heyward cranked a double to right field.
Young powered the first pitch she saw over the left centerfield fence to vault the Tigers to a 4-2 lead. Wray and Langoni followed suit with solo blasts of their own for the final margin of 6-2.
“We talked before the inning started about not giving up,” Young said. “We knew that all we needed to do was get our [bat] barrels on the ball. I’m extremely proud of the team for stepping up.”
Brittany Mack went the distance in the circle and recorded nine strikeouts to improve to 4-1 on the season. She allowed only four hits, three walks and was touched up for a pair of unearned runs.
“Brittany was in complete control and there are times when she is effective even though she’s wild,” Girouard said. “She made some big pitches when it counted. I was a little disappointed in our defense, but it was great for Brittany to finish the game with the win.”
Young opened the scoring with a solo shot to centerfield in the first inning. The Rams (6-7) capitalized on two LSU errors to plate their two runs during the fourth inning.
LSU wraps up its west coast stay with a Sunday tilt against Cal Poly. First pitch is slated for 11 a.m. CT with live stats available on LSUsports.net. Fans can follow in-games updates via the program’s social media pages at www.Facebook.com/lsusoftball and Twitter.com/LSU_Softball.
Game 1 – No. 14 California 11, No. 20 LSU 3 Cal collected 18 hits sparked by three-run home runs from Jolene Henderson and Jordan Wallace. Henderson went 4-for-5 at the plate with four RBIs and tossed a complete game in the circle. She was joined by Jamia Reid and Britt Vonk, who also posted four-hit efforts from the top of the Cal lineup.
The Golden Bears raced out to a 5-0 advantage in the first three innings. The big blow was the Wallace three-run homer off Rachele Fico during the second inning. Fico fell to 3-4 on the season.
Cassie Trosclair slapped an infield single for LSU’s first hit to open the third inning. Simone Heyward added a walk and Trosclair crossed the plate on a Juliana Santos RBI single down the left field line to make it 3-1.
Two batters later, Anissa Young drew a walk to load the bases. On the first pitch of the at-bat, Tammy Wray smashed a two-run double that one hopped over the centerfield fence to pull LSU back to 5-3. The Tigers would leave the potential tying runs in scoring position as Morgan Russell popped up followed by a Tiffany Shaw ground out to end the rally.
Cal squeezed across two runs on a walk and a hit batter during the fourth inning. The Golden Bears added four more runs in the seventh inning highlighted by Henderson’s three-run homer for the final margin of 11-3.