SALT LAKE CITY – No. 13 Utah Softball was unable to send its seniors out in style, following a 13-12 loss to No. 8 Washington in extra innings on Saturday.
In what could be her final game at Dumke Family Softball Stadium,
Hannah Flippen went 3-for-4 with two homers, a triple, three runs scored and five runs batted in.
BreOnna Castaneda was inserted into the leadoff spot for the first time and delivered with three hits and three runs scored.
Ali Aguilr homered on the first pitch of the game but Utah responded in the bottom half of the inning. After a Castaneda single, Flippen cracked a two-run homer of UW starter Madi Schreyer
With two down in the second, Castaneda singled again and Flippen smashed a triple over the head of the leftfielder to bring the freshman in.
Anissa Urtez followed with a RBI single and after a
Bridget Castro hit,
Alyssa Barrera hammered a two-run double off Samantha Manti for a 6-1 lead.
Kay Kay Fronda got things going in the third with a triple and scored on another Castaneda single. Flippen followed with her second homer of the day, a three-run bomb off Kristin Cochran, to push the Utes to double digits.
Kelly Martinez cracked Utah's third triple of the day to begin the fourth and would score on a wild pitch. After three of the next four Utes reached, Urtez drew a bases-loaded walk for a 12-1 advantage.
The unraveling began in the fifth when a pair of bunt singles followed a four-pitch walk to load the bases. Aguilar drew a walk to plate a run and Casey Stangel hit a two-run single. After a pitching change, Morganne Flores lifted a sacrifice fly to keep the game going at 12-5.
Utah thought it had escaped the sixth inning with no damage done, but the umpire mistakenly called a Washington runner safe which put two in scoring position with two outs. Video replay showed that Flippen had applied a tag on the elbow to a UW base runner that would have resulted in an inning-ending double play.
Form that point, the next five Huskies reached as Aguilar hit a two-run single, Stangel smacked a two-run double, Flores tagged a RBI double and Taylor Van Zee knocked a RBI single to make the score 12-11.
In the seventh, Utah was within one out of surviving but a ground ball was bobbled and a UW runner came home from second to even the score and send the teams to extra innings for a second-straight game.
The Huskies finished things off in the eighth on Van Zee's sacrifice fly as the Utes went the final four innings without registering a hit. Taran Alvelo got the final nine outs to win her third game of the series, improving to 28-6.
Hailey Hilburn suffered the loss, her second in as many days.
Katie Donovan started and pitched four solid innings until running into trouble.
Miranda Viramontes went 2 2/3 innings of relief and did not allow an earned run.
The Utes will now await their NCAA Regional fate with the Selection Show scheduled for 8 p.m. MT tomorrow evening on ESPN2