STARKVILLE, Miss. – Northwestern State entered Sunday's matchup with Longwood wanting to make sure it beat every opponent it faced in Mississippi State's Bulldog Slamboree.
The Lady Demons avenged their earlier loss to Longwood with a 2-1 win Sunday to finish the tournament 4-1. NSU opened the tournament Friday with a 2-1 loss in which the Lancers plated a seventh-inning run.
But on Sunday, NSU (15-5) retired the final seven Longwood batters to protect its 2-1 lead.
Sophomore pitcher
Micaela Bouvier (8-2) scattered three hits and two walks in her sixth complete game of the season. Bouvier has recorded a win in five of her last six appearances, allowing four hits or less in her last five appearances.
"Bouvier grinded out the win today even though she didn't have her best stuff," said NSU coach
Donald Pickett. "We've got to get back this week and work on some things with our pitchers.
"She plugged along and allowed just the one unearned run. But we've got to get our pitchers throwing the ball like we know they can throw it."
NSU scored the decisive two runs in the fifth inning. After sophomore
Sidney Salmans and junior
Kellye Kincannon led off with a single and double, respectively, Salmans scored the game's first run on a Sydney Gay (3-3) wild pitch.
Junior
Micayla Sorosiak singled in Kincannon two batters later for NSU's second run. Sorosiak went 3-for-4 and had eight hits in her last four games. She's boosted her season batting average to .326.
"We had good approaches at the plate, but we left too many on base," said Pickett, whose Lady Demons stranded 10 runners. "We took too many pitches today, and we've got to cut down on that.
"We want to put the ball in play and be aggressive."
Longwood responded in the bottom half of the inning, scoring Justina Augustine (lead-off double) on a Glenn Walters sacrifice fly. The run was unearned because Augustine advanced to third base on a throwing error.
NSU totaled nine hits with senior
Natalie Landry (2-for-4) recording multiple hits in her second straight game. Junior
Jordan Rains and Bouvier also recorded hits.
The Lady Demons missed an opportunity in the second inning when they loaded the bases with no outs via singles by Bouvier and Landry and a
Hailee Rhodes walk. Gay entered the game, collecting a strikeout, fielder's choice and a line out to end the threat.
NSU thrived in its toughest tournament yet as all four opponents were NCAA Tournament participants in 2015. The Lady Demons knocked off Mississippi State 1-0, Chattanooga 6-5, Western Kentucky 8-2 and Longwood 2-1. MSU was receiving votes in top-25 polls this week after being ranked No. 23 this past week.
"We did a really good job this weekend, and our offense continued to improve," Pickett said. "We played really good defense all weekend.
"We got some good pitching in games, but we still have some work to do to get them going."
The Lady Demons' 15-5 start is the second-best in Pickett's tenure (eight seasons) and tied for third best overall. NSU started the 2013 season 18-3, the 1990 season 16-4 and the 1983 season 15-5. Pickett is the only coach to have two of NSU's four best starts.
NSU returns to Lady Demon Diamond to host ULM on Wednesday at 6 p.m.
