OKLAHOMA CITY – A home run and two-RBI single from Charlotte Morgan provided three of Alabama’s five runs as the Crimson Tide eliminated Arizona by a score of 5-1 on Saturday afternoon at ASA Hall of Fame Stadium.
Alabama (57-7) advances to face Louisiana-Lafayette at approximately 8 pm CDT tonight. Arizona completes its season with a 41-19 record.
Charlotte Morgan broke open a scoreless game with two outs in the top of the third inning, blasting a monster home run over the bleachers down the left field line to give Alabama a 1-0 lead
Arizona answered in the bottom half of the frame. K’Lee Arredondo reached on an error to lead off the inning and was safe on a fielders choice sacrifice by Jenae Leles. Arredondo came around to score on a single by Stacie Chambers, knotting the score at 1-1.
The Crimson Tide busted the game wide open in the sixth inning. A one-out walk to Ashley Holcombe started the Tide rolling. Whitney Larsen followed with a single down the left field line and Brittany Rogers doubled to plate Holcombe. After a walk to Jordan Praytor loaded the bases, Morgan struck again, knocking a two-run single to left. Those two RBI gave Morgan 79 on the season, which is a new Southeastern Conference record.
A fifth run came across on a Kelley Montalvo double, giving Alabama a 5-1 lead.
That was plenty of offense for Kelsi Dunne, who improves to 26-5 with the victory. Dunne struck out five and walked two, allowing one unearned run on four hits.
Taryne Mowatt struck out eight but walked seven, allowing five runs on 10 hits. She completes the season with a record of 29-15.
This was Alabama’s first-ever victory over Arizona and its third WCWS win in program history. The previous two victories were elimination victories over DePaul in 2000 and 2005.
“I think this was probably the best game we have played here,” said Alabama head coach Patrick Murphy. “I thought today was a pretty good showing by us with 10 hits. I think if we keep hitting we can go for a long time.”