Juan DeLeon

SB: HCU heads to Commerce for final series of regular season

5/1/2024 3:01:00 PM

Huskies look to build momentum heading into SLC Tournament

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HCU (20-24, 7-14 SLC) at TEXAS A&M-COMMERCE (8-43 / 1-20 SLC)

📆 Thursday – May 2, 2024 (DH at 5 pm)
📆 Friday – May 3, 2024 (5 pm)
🏟️ John Cain Family Softball Complex – Commerce, Texas
📈 LIVE STATS ➡️ Game 1 - Game 2 - Game 3
📺 ESPN+ ➡️ Game 1 - Game 2 - Game 3
🗒️ GAME NOTES

Houston Christian University hits the road for the final regular season conference series of the year, taking on Texas A&M-Commerce University at John Cain Family Softball Complex. The series, originally scheduled for Friday and Saturday, was pushed up a day to Thursday and Friday to accommodate HCU softball's participation in Spring Commencement on Saturday, May 4.

HCU sent its 11 seniors off in style last weekend, sweeping Northwestern State University to clinch a spot in the 2024 Southland Conference Tournament in Hammond, Louisiana next week. HCU's senior pitchers, Lyndie Swanson, Ronni Grofman and Katy Janes, were each masterful in their final appearance in the circle at Husky Field. The trio limited the Lady Demons to nine hits and two runs in the three-game series, including a no-hitter by Grofman in the back-end of the Friday twi-night doubleheader.

Swanson got things started in the opener with a 6-2 victory. She shut things down after NSU posted a two-run third inning, beginning what would become a stretch of 18 straight scoreless innings for the Huskies to finish off the series. Swanson would allow her last hit in the sixth, and Grofman would then no-hit the Demons in a 2-0 victory in the nightcap.

Grofman was particularly efficient, facing three over the minimum and fanning two while needing just 81 pitches in 81 minutes to complete her first no-hitter as a Husky and the 33^rd in program history. Her effort landed her the first Southland Conference Pitcher of the Week honors of her career for the span of April 22-28. The senior from Kingwood became the third Husky (Jasie Roberts and Lyndie Swanson) to net a weekly SLC accolade this season, a program first since joining the league in 2013.

The hits kept not coming for the Demons in the series finale on Saturday. Katy Janes took a no-hitter to the fourth, before NSU finally got a base knock to snap an 11.2 inning hitless stretch. The senior from Huffman was in complete control, fanning three and walking none while tossing just 87 pitches.

All told the senior trio limited Northwestern State to nine hits over 21 innings. Grofman and Janes combined to throw 168 total pitches in their two contests after Swanson threw 101 on Friday.

Jasie Roberts, the HCU SAAC (Student-Athlete Advisory Committee) President for the last three years, leads the Huskies on the offensive side. She paces the team with a .354 batting average with three homers and 18 RBI, both second on the club.

She is eighth in the league in batting average and leads the league in being hit-by-pitch, having been beaned seven times on the season. Roberts is tied in homers with junior outfielder Maddy Bailey and senior second basemen Kaicey Hagler, who is batting a career-best .264 with 15 RBI this season. Bailey is third on the club in RBI with 17, and leads the outfielders with 10 assists.

Roberts has been climbing the HCU career leaderboards all season. After moving into the Top 10 in at-bats and hits against Penn, she has now added RBI and doubles to her list, as her 2-3, 2-double, 3-RBI outing against Baylor moved her into the top 10 of each of those categories. Her solo HR in the second game of the DH against SLU gave her the 100th RBI of her career, becoming just the ninth player in school history to reach that mark, and she now stands eighth all-time.

The senior from Deer Park, Texas became the ninth player to appear in 200 contests as a Husky in the McNeese finale, and three more outings will move her into fifth place all-time. During the Nicholls series, she became the fourth player in school history to reach 600 at-bats for a career, and she is now just four at-bats away from second.

HCU has five total players in double figure RBI, led by Haylie Savage with 23. Savage also paces the Huskies in homers (7), doubles (10) and runs scored (34). She is eighth in the SLC in slugging (.550) and 10th in OPS (.945), while placing eighth in run scored, ninth in doubles, and third in homers.

Savage posted her second career four-hit game in the finale against McNeese, going 4-5 with two stolen bases. Her previous four-hit game came in a record-setting day for the junior from Angleton, when she went 4-4 and clobbered two homers while driving in a career-best eight runs in a 19-8 win at UTSA last season. Her walk-off grand slam in the finale at home against Nicholls two weeks ago was the second of her career. She is now second on the team in batting, hitting at a .295 clip on the season while matching her career-best with the seven dingers.

AB Garcia is batting .293 on the season, and is 15-17 in stolen bases, upping her career total to 38. She is just one away from fifth place with just six between her and the second spot on the all-time leaderboard. The program record is 88, set by Jennifer Futral, who is also one of just five players to swipe 20 bags in a single season. Garcia was one short of that mark in 2023 with 19.

The Huskies will bid adieu this weekend also to the senior trio of hurlers: Lyndie Swanson, Katy Janes and Ronni Grofman.

Swanson evened her mark at 7-7 on the season with her win over Northwestern State to take the team lead in victories. The Katy native leads the club with a 3.10 ERA and she remains10^th in the SLC with 71 K's in 97 innings. She is fourth in the league in strikeouts looking with 24.

She stands just one victories and four strikeouts from the Top 10 in each of those categories. Two more appearances in the circle this season will tie her with Jennifer Elias for the top spot all-time. She is already one of just nine hurlers with over 400 career innings, sitting sixth all-time with 471.

Grofman moved to 6-9 with the no-hit win and dropped her ERA to 3.19 while tossing her team-best ninth complete game. Janes moved back over .500 with her victory over NSU, and is now 5-4 on the year.

HCU and Texas A&M-Commerce have met just three times, those coming last year at Husky Field. The Huskies swept the series, winning 17-3 and 2-1 in the Friday pair with an 8-6 victory on Saturday.

The Lions are led on offense by Tehya Pitts, who paces the team in batting average at .308 and stolen bases, as her 18 ranks fifth in the league. She is also first on the club in hits and runs scored.

Diamond Sefe is batting .276 with three homers and 13 RBI and has 10 steals, while Ashlynn Griffith bats .250 with a 13 swipes. Isabella Arzola has 11 stoeln bases to complete the double-figure quartet of base-nabbers. Charli Anger leads the Lions with four homers and 20 RBI.

Julia Sanchez has taken the circle 33 times in TAMUC's 51 games this season, and is 5-13 with a 5.70 ERA and five complete games. She has registered 65 K's in 113.2 inning pitched.

The Southland Conference Tournament is from May 7-10 hosted by Southeastern Louisiana University at North Oak Park in Hammond. The Huskies are locked into the opening round first round elimination game on Tuesday at 1pm.

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Huskies look to build momentum heading into SLC Tournament

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