NATCHITOCHES – Little things turned into big things for Northwestern State in their 5-3 loss to Lamar in Saturday's Southland Conference series finale.
 
Like the second game on Friday, the Demons (5-39, 2-19) were unable to produce with runners in scoring position early in the game while a pair of free passes and an error led to one big inning for Lamar (25-19, 13-8) and the ensuing sweep of the Demons.
 
"We did a lot of good things today, had some good at-bats, got some runners on and made some plays," head coach Jenny Fuller said. "But we made a few mistakes today and those have snowballed on us in other games and it did again today. We're a young team and even though they've all played a bunch of games this year they're still learning how to handle those big situations."
 
The Demons showed their patience at the plate through the first inning plus of Saturday's game against a walk-prone pitcher. After a walk in the first and two more in the second, starter Kaylee Cuevas was chased from the game.
 
The two second-inning walks helped set up the Demons first scoring chance in the process with Savannah Coleman standing at third and Bailie Ragsdale at second with only one out. A three-pitch strikeout and surprise bunt hit attempt ended in two outs and the first two of eight total runners left on base for the Demons.
 
NSU had the leadoff batter reach base in the second, third and fourth innings but each time were turned away by Lamar reliever Sabrina Jolin.
 
The effort of Brooklynn Stohler, who made her fifth start and seventh appearance in the past eight days for a total of 28.0 innings and two complete games, kept the Demons in the game through four scoreless innings, matching what she did less that 24 hours earlier with five scoreless in game two on Friday.
 
Stohler limited Lamar to just three hits through 4 1/3 innings after holding them to just four hits through 5 1/3 on Friday.
 
One of just two free passes she surrendered on the day however led to was was the game-deciding inning for the Cardinals.
 
A hit batter put the leadoff runner aboard for the Cardinals in the fifth and was moved to second on a sacrifice bunt and turned the lineup over back to the top. A base hit to right center scored the go-ahead run from second and began a stretch of four straight batters who reached safely leading to three total runs.
 
An error at first with the bases loaded led to two runs on the play, and after a ground ball to third for the would-be final out of the inning, a single up the middle scored two more runs for a five-run frame for the visiting Cardinals.
 
The Demons got the leadoff batter on for the fourth time in the game in the sixth, a single up the middle from DJ Lynch. With runners at the corners later in the inning after a Peyton Peck hit and productive out from Savannah Coleman that advanced the runner to third, the first of two Lamar errors in the final two innings allowed the Demons to score their first run.
 
Back-to-back base hits from Aly Delafield and Sophia Livers in the seventh set up a two-out rally in the bottom of the seventh for the Demons. They moved to third on a ground out to the right side and scored easily on a double to the left center gap from Brynn Daniel on the ninth pitch of her at-bat.
 
A groundout to short ended the inning and the game in the 11^th conference loss this season by two runs or less.
 
Delafield and Peck finished the game with a pair of hits each and Daniel her fourth muti-RBI game of the season.