Carson gets much-needed sweep at Wooster

RENO - Christina Gallegos entered the second game of Saturday's doubleheader against Wooster with something to prove to herself after getting yanked early in Friday's game.

Gallegos turned in her best effort of the season, allowing just four hits to spark the Senators to a 6-1 win over Wooster and a much-needed sweep of their Sierra League doubleheader.

Carson, thanks to a passed ball in the top of the 11th inning, won the opener 4-3 despite stranding a season-high 18 baserunners.

Carson improved to 9-6. Fallon swept Galena and moved to 10-5 while the Grizzlies fell to 7-8.

"We got what we needed I hope," said Carson coach Scott Vickrey. "It was pretty frustrating out there the first game with the amount of people we left on. We failed to execute at certain times. We kept trying to play small ball, but we'd either pop the ball up or bunt it too hard. We weren't getting the job done.

"Lindsay (Ashbaugh) went more than we intended her to go, but she did a great job in the circle. Christina didn't have anything to prove to me. It just came down to whether she was hitting her spots or not."

The big key for Gallegos was her ability to throw her change-up early in the count and throw it for strikes.

"That (change-up) is my bread and butter," she said. "I've been throwing it since I was 10. It keeps the hitters off balance and allows me to work on other stuff.

"I know why I got pulled the other day. I had to prove something to myself. My goal was to do better than I did the day before."

Carson scored all the runs it needed in the top of the first against Andrea Brown thanks to a run-scoring single by Jocelyn Young and a two-run double by Moriah Lane, who was walked six times in the first game. Lane drove in seven runs in Friday's 9-4 win.

Wooster scored its only run in the first thanks to a one-out throwing error which made the run unearned.

Wooster got only two baserunners as far as second base the remainder of the game. Gallegos fanned three and walked just one.

Carson lost a chance to expand on its lead in the third when Young was caught too far off third and was thrown out at the plate.

The Senators scored three more times in the fourth, two coming on a single by Lauren Knorzer.

Carson did load the bases in the fifth with two outs, but Young rolled out to short to end the threat.

The opener was a pitcher's duel between Lindsay Ashbaugh and Wooster's Rachel Howell. Ashbaugh allowed six hits and Howell scattered 10.

Neither team scored in the first four innings, as Carson stranded seven runners in that span. Twice Carson left the bases loaded in the first three innings, as Lisa Yamamoto grounded out and struck out.

Carson took a 1-0 lead in the fifth when Megan Hein doubled and scored on a double by Knorzer. Natalie Morrow flied to right, stranding runners at second and third.

Wooster took a 3-1 lead in the bottom of the inning, scoring three times off Ashbaugh. Two of those runs came on Melanie Pfeiffer's triple to right-centerfield. Pfeiffer's ball should have been cut off, but K.C Withrow took a bad angle to the ball and it rolled by her. The final run in the inning scored on a two-out error by shortstop Marissa Lucido.

Carson tied the game at 3 in the top of the sixth on Hein's two-run double to deep right-centerfield. Wooster's Quinn Sheehy appeared to lose the ball in the sun.

The score remained deadlocked until the top of the 11th when Yamamoto walked, advanced to third on a single by Morgan Kleine and scored on a passed ball.

Hein and Kleine led Carson with two hits each in the second game.

Carson returns to action Tuesday at 2 p.m. when it hosts Bishop Manogue for a doubleheader in what could be a battle for third place.