The Long Beach State softball team used dominant pitching to sweep Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in a three-game series this past weekend winning 4-1 and 3-2 on in a doubleheader on Friday and 2-1 on Saturday.
Senior Taylor Petty and sophomore Erin Jones-Wesley combined efforts and gave up a total of 3 earned runs while striking out 17 to give the 49ers (16-20, 4-2 Big West) their first series sweep of the season.
The first game of Friday’s doubleheader was started by Petty, who was coming off a successful season debut at UC Santa Barbara in which she gave up 3 runs and stuck out 15 in 11.1 innings.
Petty worked out of a two-on, two-out jam in the first inning and then went on cruise control, experiencing only a minor hiccup in the fourth when a leadoff double and sacrifice fly resulted in her only earned run of the game.
The ‘Niners didn’t give Petty any offensive help, however, until the bottom of the fifth. It was then that they took advantage of an early error by Cal Poly shortstop Celina Lafrades and put up four runs, three of them unearned.
In a game where the 49ers were only able to muster four hits, they managed to bat around in that inning and give Petty the support she needed to earn her second win of the season.
The second game on Friday greatly resembled the first in that it took a strong pitching performance to take the victory.
Jones-Wesley made the start this time and mowed down Cal Poly hitters until the sixth inning when she gave up a pair of runs.
By that time, however, she already had a three-run cushion thanks to RBIs from senior first baseman Jennifer Madigan, junior right fielder Nalani St. Germain and senior designated player Alisha Rosen in the first and third innings.
Jones-Wesley closed out the game with a two-strikeout seventh inning and improved her record to 13-10 on the year.
In Saturday’s finale, Petty and Jones-Wesley shared pitching duties and dominated once again. They combined to give up only four hits between them and were crucial players in the 49ers’ 2-1 win.
The only runs offensively came from a few mistakes by Cal Poly, as senior left fielder Megan Denio scored on a wild pitch in the third and an error by Mustangs shortstop Kim Westlund led to another LBSU run in the fourth.
The ‘Niners improved their Big West record to 4-2 and jumped into a tie for second in the conference as a result of the sweep.
They are currently one game behind UC Davis and are tied with Cal State Fullerton and Pacific. The 49ers will count on Petty and Jones-Wesley once again as they head up to Davis this weekend and try to steal first place away from the Aggies.