Griz split on opening day at Big Sky Championship

Wednesday, May 11

Ogden, Utah

Noon

Montana

20-25

Portland State

26-17

Montana

Portland State

Photos: Big Sky Conference

5/11/2022 9:04:00 PM | Softball

Box Score 1 Box Score 2

By: Montana Sports Information

The Montana softball team, the No. 6 seed, knocked off No. 3 Portland State on Wednesday before falling to No. 2 Sacramento State as the Big Sky Conference Championship got under way in Ogden, Utah.

The Grizzlies rallied from a 4-2 deficit to defeat the Vikings 5-4 in eight innings in a first-round game on a pinch-hit RBI double by freshman Presley Jantzi and four innings of scoreless relief by Allie Brock, who picked up win No. 10 on the season.

The Hornets took down Montana in the Grizzlies' second game of the day, 12-4 in six innings. Sacramento State scored eight runs on three home runs and pulled away from a 4-4 deadlock with three in the fifth, five in the sixth.

The loss dropped Montana to the elimination bracket. The Grizzlies will face Northern Colorado in a loser-out game at 2:30 p.m. on Thursday. The No. 4 Bears lost 7-2 to No. 5 Idaho State on Wednesday.

In the day's other game, No. 1 Weber State shut out Idaho State 10-0. The Wildcats and Hornets, the top two seeds, will play at 5 p.m. on Thursday, with the winner advancing to Saturday's championship game.

It was a tall task for the Grizzlies on Wednesday. They faced first-team All-Big Sky pitcher Olivia Grey in their opener, then had to face Big Sky Pitcher of the Year Marissa Bertuccio in their second game of the day.

Big Sky Player of the Year Maygen McGrath got Montana rolling in both games. She led off the top of the first with a home run against Grey, then did the same thing against Bertuccio a few hours later, giving McGrath 17 home runs on the season.

Cami Sellers put Montana up 2-0 against the Vikings. She followed McGrath's leadoff home run with one of her own in the top of the first, an opposite-field shot over the left-field fence.

Portland State, last year's tournament champion, scored twice in the second, once in the third and again in the fourth to take a 4-2 lead.

Montana would tie it in the fifth. After Brooklyn Weisgram led off the inning with a single, McGrath got hit by a pitch and Grey appeared to intentionally walk Sellers on four pitches to load the bases with one out.

Grey got a pop-up in foul territory for the second out but then walked Kylie Becker on four pitches to make it 4-3 and hit Elise Ontiveros to bring in the tying run.

Brock entered in the bottom of the fifth and kept Portland State off the scoreboard the next four innings.

That set the stage for the Grizzlies to win their second extra-inning postseason game in program history.

Kylie Becker led off the top of the eighth with a single to right and was on second with two outs when Jantzi got the call to pinch hit. She came through with a double to the wall in left-center that gave Montana its first lead since the second inning.

With the potential tying run on second base in the bottom of the eighth, Brock got a strikeout to pick up the victory and give the Grizzlies a pair of 10-game winners for the first time in program history.

Grey dropped to 17-7 with the loss. Two of her losses have come against Montana.

McGrath led off the game against Sacramento State with a home run off Bertuccio, and Julie Phelps made it 2-0 in the top of the first with a double to left-center that scored Jantzi.

The Grizzlies, who scored one run on three hits over 13 innings in two regular-season losses to Bertuccio, finished the opening inning with two runs on four hits.

Montana went up 3-1 in the third on a delayed steal of home by Ontiveros, but the Hornets responded with the biggest hit of the game in the bottom half of the inning.

With Brock one strike away from getting out of the bottom of the third without a run allowed, Carley Morfey hit a two-out, three-run home run off the foul pole in left to give Sacramento State a 4-3 lead.

Phelps, who had three hits in the game, tied it at 4-4 in the top of the fifth with a single to left, but Morfey hit another three-run home run in the bottom of the fifth and Lewa Day hit a two-run shot in the sixth as the Hornets pulled away.

Montana got to Bertuccio for 10 hits. Only Nebraska, the Big Ten runner-up, had more hits against Bertuccio in a game this season.

Northern Colorado won two of three games against Montana when the teams met in Missoula at the end of April.