Port Coquitlam’s Alia Stachoski pitched three victories — including a two-hit shutout — last weekend to lead the Simon Fraser University Clan women’s softball team to its first Great Northwest Athletic Conference playoff berth in five years.
Those playoffs, involving the top four teams in the conference, begin today (Thursday) at Porter Park in Portland. The double-elimination tournament concludes Saturday. The Clan are the third seed, behind No. 1, Northwest Nazarene, and No. 2, Central Washington, but ahead of fourth seed Western Oregon. SFU has never managed to advance past the regional championships to the NCAA Division II West Regional tournament.
Stachoski was credited with both wins in a doubleheader sweep of Concordia, Sunday in Portland, Ore. She scattered three hits and struck out two batters in five innings of the Clan’s 11-0 victory over the Cavaliers in the second game. The win improved the senior’s pitching record to 13 wins against 10 losses.
In the first game, Stachoski spotted Concordia a 2-0 lead when she surrendered a pair of runs in the bottom of the fourth inning. But her teammates got those back plus another when they put three runs across the plate in the top of the sixth inning.
The Cavaliers tied it in their half of the inning. But an unearned run scored by the Clan’s Dallas Tilley in the top of the eighth inning after she’d reached base on a throwing error proved the difference.
Concordia loaded the bases with two out in the bottom of the inning, but Stachoski got Cavaliers’ batter Courtney Somers to fly out to right field to end the threat.
Saturday, after an 8-0 loss to Western Oregon in the opening game of their doubleheader, Stachoski kept the Clan in the playoff hunt by limiting the Wolves to just two hits in the Clan’s 4-0 victory. She also struck out six batters.
The Clan took a 1-0 lead in the top of the third inning when Kate Fergusson singled home Victoria Saunders, who had reached base on an error than advanced to second when Taylor Gillis smacked a single to left center field.
They then added three insurance runs — including a homer by Chelsea Hotner — in the top of the seventh inning to round out the scoring.
The win meant four teams were log-jammed for third place in the conference heading into Sunday’s games.
• Stachoski’s winning weekend earned her honours as the GNAC’s softball pitcher of the week.
