(Photos/Austin Lindsey)

Game 1

The Golden Eagles get their second win of the weekend against the Houston Baptist Huskies, 3-0.

The Eagles were led by junior pitcher Morgan Leinstock’s impressive shutout performance through all seven innings of play, allowing five hits and registering eight strikeouts.

“Morgan… she’s kind of put the team on her shoulders here the past few weeks… it’s something that she did last year as well,” Head Coach Brian Levin said. “So, you kind of expected it out of her-she never fails to come through.” 

The Huskies could not find an offensive edge throughout the first two innings besides from the help of an error by Southern Miss’ Paige Kilgore.

Southern Miss found its bats in the third inning and only the third inning, scoring all three runs then.

The third inning started with an early strikeout by Lorna Agren. Destini Brown then got a base hit single to get the team started. 

Tata Davis hit a base hit single on the next at-bat, which advanced Brown to third, allowing Davis to advance to second on the throw to third. 

Jana Lee broke the 0-0 tie with an RBI single to bring Brown home, giving the Golden Eagles a 1-0 lead. 

The Huskies’ Lyndie Swanson relieved Sarah Venker in the bottom of the third after the Golden Eagles’ Kilgore was hit by a pitch.

Maria Smith then hit a two-run RBI single to bring in Lee and Davis to up the lead to 3-0. 

The score did not change throughout the rest of the game as neither team overcame their lack of offense but the Golden Eagles held its lead to take the game.

Game 2

Golden Eagles Softball won its third straight game of the weekend against the Mississippi Valley State Delta Devils, 5-3. 

Golden Eagles’ starting pitcher Paige Kilgore had a rough start in the first inning, allowing two runs to give Southern Miss an early 2-0 deficit. 

Head Coach Brian Levin did not get worried too quickly about the early base hitting from the Delta Devils. 

“Well, anytime you’re down in the first inning, you know there is a lot of game left,” Levin said. “If it had gotten any worse than 2-0, then yeah, but I thought we were still in pretty good position.” 

Destini Brown proved Levin right with a solo home run in her lead off position to close the gap to 2-1. 

The Golden Eagles’ best offensive inning occurred in the second, where they scored three of their five runs.

Natalie Taylor’s RBI triple started the scoring for the Golden Eagles to bring in pinch runner Columbia Holeman.

Taylor then scored on a wild pitch from Mississippi Valley State pitcher Ashlyn Matthews. 

Alyssa Davis finished the scoring off for the inning with a ground out to the pitcher, but Brown still scored on the late throw to extend the Southern Miss lead to 4-2.

The two teams then traded runs in the fourth inning to make the score 5-3.

The scoring slowed down and Southern Miss held its lead to third straight victory of the weekend, 5-3. 

\Levin believes this winning streak is something that could motivate his team as the season continues.

“Oh, they’re [three straight wins] really, really important… a player and team culture that’s, you know, conducive to winning and… we’re just trying to drive this home,” Levin said. “Keep your intensity. I think young players, they tend to have that early and then it fades, so we got to learn to keep that for seven straight innings.”