(Tucson, AZ) Troy Hutchinson
During the first game of the doubleheader against Grand Canyon University Arizona was able to survive winning 1-0 mostly do from a strong pitching performance from ace Taylor McQuillin.
This gave the Wildcats seven straight wins going all the way back to the series finale against ASU. Arizona would look to complete the sweep of the doubleheader with Alyssa Denham in the circle.
Denham was her usual self in the circle tonight working inside and out keeping the Grand Canyon hitters at bay. Throughout the night GCU was unable to get any kind of momentum going against Denham, combining for a total of four hits during this six–inning game. GCU stayed aggressive as well, which played right in the hands of Denham who was able to get through the game with only 79 pitches tossed.
The focus on the second game is mostly offense. The Wildcats were attacking from the get go even though in the first inning GCU was able to make some amazing plays to keep the Cats off the board to start the game.
After that, it was all Arizona with Jesse Harper getting it going in the bottom of the 2nd hitting her PAC-12 leading 16th homerun of the season.
Arizona would get two more runs in the inning from two RBI singles from Carli Campbell and Aleah Craighton making it 3-0 Arizona through two innings in the game.
Once Harper took the PAC-12 homerun lead it wouldn’t be long until she was tied again. In the bottom of the 3rd inning Alyssa Palomino hit her 16th homerun of the season tying Harper for the conference homerun lead.
This would be a theme as the game rolled along. Both Harper and Palomino went on to hit another homerun giving them both 17 homeruns on the season for the conference lead.
Palomino was asked if her and Harper keep track of their homerun race she had this to say “Yea, it was so funny after my second one me and my trainer were in the back saying that she (Harper) is going to hit a homerun because that’s just what we are doing”. They would end the night tied at 17 a piece for the homerun lead in the PAC-12 conference.
Arizona was not done yet, in the bottom of the 6th inning the Wildcats would tac on to more runs to win the game by run rule, thanks to freshman Jenna Kean who hit her first career homerun tonight to end the game, giving the Wildcats the 9-0 victory over GCU.
Kean had this to say about her first career homerun, “Well, it felt really great, it was kind of funny because the inning before that me, Carli and Aleah were talking about it, that we just want this game to be over one of us needs to walk it off, and like Carli called it and it happened so it was pretty cool.”
During Kean’s time at the lead-off while Ashleigh Hughes has been out, she is 5 for her last 16 at-bats giving her a .313 batting average for that stretch batting in the lead-off spot for the Wildcats.
Arizona will look to complete the sweep today at 1p.m. Tucson time.
