UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- With Penn State riding momentum after forcing extra innings with a bottom-of-the-seventh rally, Northwestern senior Olivia Duehr (Antioch, Ill./Antioch) broke out "Wonderboy" to smash her fourth home run of the series in the top of the eighth inning, helping the Wildcats to a series sweep with a 5-4 (8) victory in Sunday's game three at Beard Field.
The victory completes NU's second straight sweep of Penn State in University Park. It also gives the Wildcats seven wins in a row and Ws in 11 of their last 12 games. Northwestern is 14-10 overall on the year and 3-0 in the Big Ten while Penn State falls to 13-15 on the season, 0-3 in the conference.
Northwestern now heads to New York City for several team events Monday prior to facing Hofstra and Fordham in a doubleheader Tuesday, March 24, in Hempstead, N.Y. The games mark a homecoming for NU associate head coach Caryl Drohan, who was an assistant at Hofstra for five seasons before coming to Evanston.
After hitting nine home runs in the first two games of the series Saturday, Northwestern got its 10th in the top of the first Sunday. After two quick outs, junior Andrea Filler (Fort Wayne, Ind./Bishop Dwenger) drove a solo shot out of the park to give NU a 1-0 lead on her sixth homer of the season. The Wildcats attempted to rally for more with two-out Julia Kuhn (Middletown, N.J./Middletown South) and Brianna LeBeau (Worth, Ill./H.L. Richards) singles, but an Anna Edwards (La Canada, Calif./La Canada) line shot to right field was caught to prevent the lead from growing larger -- for the moment.
On the first pitch of the top of the second inning, freshman Sammy Nettling (Tucson, Ariz./Corona del Sol) lined a pitch over the wall for the first home run of her career to become the seventh different Wildcat to leave the park in the series. Sophomore Alcy Bush (Riverside, Calif./Martin Luther King) then was immediately hit by a pitch to reach base, moving up when Duehr grounded out to first. The inning continued with a Sabrina Rabin (St. Charles, Ill./St. Charles) infield single before both Bush and Rabin moved up on a double steal. Filler followed with her fifth sacrifice fly of the season to bring Bush across, pushing the lead to 3-0.
In the bottom of the inning, Penn State got its first hit and run of the game against Northwestern starter Kristen Wood (Trevor, Wis./Wilmot Union) via a two-out solo home run, cutting the Wildcats' edge to 3-1.
NU got that run back on the first pitch of the third when LeBeau hit a sky-high home run out of Beard Field for her second four-bagger of the series, her fourth of the year and her 15th as a Wildcat. The blast chased PSU starter Marlaina Laubach from the circle in favor of Macy Jones, who hit gave up a Nettling single before hitting Bush with pitch. She would recover, however, to keep the Wildcats from further scoring.
The first two errors of the series for Northwestern both came in the third inning, and the result was an unearned Penn State run on a sacrifice fly to make the Wildcats' lead once again two runs, 4-2. The Nittany Lions threatened more with the bases loaded, but Wood got a three-pitch backward K to leave `em loaded.
Jones, the starting left fielder and No. 2 batter for the Nittany Lions, entered the game having thrown just 15.0 innings in 2015, but she was the antidote to the NU offensive juggernaut that PSU had been searching for all series long. She allowed just a two-out walk to Kuhn in the fourth and then retired the Wildcats 1-2-3 in the fifth to keep Northwestern from adding to its two-run lead.
Meanwhile, Penn State continued to threaten, getting two runners aboard in both the fourth and fifth innings before Wood was able to end the rallies. In the fifth, Andrea DiPrima (Arlington Heights, Ill./Buffalo Grove) helped by ranging into the gap in right center to catch a liner on the run and preserve the lead.
Northwestern got back-to-back singles from Duehr and Rabin to start the sixth, but yet another NU lineout -- something of a theme all series long despite the Wildcats' run production -- aided in stranding them on base.
The Nittany Lions finally were able to cash in on their rallies in the bottom of the seventh, starting with a leadoff triple. Later, following an infield single, a batter hit a double off the very top of the wall that tied the score and came within inches of ending the game. Instead, Wood was able to carefully tiptoe through the PSU lineup before coming up with a bases-loaded strikeout to send the game to extra innings.
With one out in the top of the eighth, Duehr came to the plate and continued her unconscious series, smoking a pitch deep and gone to put Northwestern back on top in the game, 5-4. The blast was Duehr's fourth of the series, her fifth of the year and her 19th at Northwestern.
In the bottom of the eighth, the first two Nittany Lions to the plate reached base before a sacrifice bunt moved them up to second and third. Wood got a pop up to Filler in shallow center for the second out before Edwards swallowed up a two-out grounder and fired across the diamond to end the game.
Wood went the distance in her first-career complete-game of more than 7.0 innings, allowing four runs (three earned) on six hits and four walks with seven strikeouts. She picked up all three wins on the weekend and now is 7-3 in 2015.
Rabin, LeBeau, Duehr and Nettling all had two hits apiece to lead NU at the plate while Filler drove in two. Northwestern's four home runs in this contest gave it 13 in the three-game series after entering the weekend with 17 homers in its prior 21 games.
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