Andrea Gustafson Earns 500th Career Win in Seward Sweep

Sitting at 490 wins coming into a stretch in which her Seward County Lady Saints were set to play 8 of 10 games at home in Liberal before a 13 game road stretch, things had to fall just perfect for Seward Head Coach Andrea Gustafson for her to get her 500^th win at Lady Saints Field in Liberal.  Well the stars aligned and after Seward's 9^th and 10^th straight wins, Gustafson was drenched by the traditional cooler of water after her team's games on Wednesday as Seward swept visiting Dodge City 7-0 and 8-2 to give the 13^th year Head Coach her 500^th career win.  

Despite the wind blowing out to start game one of the doubleheader, there wasn't much action happening at the plate early on as Seward and Dodge both struggled with the bats against Lady Saints starter Alexa O'Brien and Conquistador right hander Jordan Mecham.  Through 3 ½ innings of play, the two teams were scoreless with just one hit each on the board. 

It looked like the game would head to the 5^th inning scoreless as Seward had nobody on with two outs in the bottom of the 4^th when freshman Grace Petersen stepped up and hit a line shot over the left field wall for a solo home run to get the Lady Saints on the board and put Seward up 1-0. 

O'Brien worked a quick top half of the 5^th against the Conqs, retiring the side on just six pitches to keep Seward on top 1-0. 

The freshman right hander worked another scoreless frame in the 6^th and Seward's offense finally came alive in the bottom of the inning as they capitalized on a two out Dodge City error to score six runs and blow the game open 7-0.  In the big frame, the Lady Saints got four consecutive two out RBI singles from Vanessa Oakden, Joe Ann Rapoza, Tiffanie Bolanos, and Hannah Clark to open up the seven run lead. 

In the 7^th Dodge again had no chance against O'Brien as she picked up her sixth strikeout of the game to finish the Conqs off and give the Lady Saints a 7-0 win. 

O'Brien was outstanding in the circle for Seward in the win, allowing just 1 hit in her shutout to improve to 13-6 on the year.  She did walk 5 in the victory, but evened that out with the 6 strikeouts.  Seven different Lady Saints had hits in the win and six different players had RBI's for Seward.  Kolby Hamilton and Grace Petersen each had 2 hits and an RBI for the gals in green. 

SEWARD COUNTY/DODGE CITY GAME ONE BOX SCORE

In game two, Jaclyn Wagner was in the circle for the Lady Saints and she was equally as sharp as her co-ace O'Brien early on, spinning back to back scoreless frames to open the game while Seward rewarded her with a pair of 2^nd inning runs on a sacrifice fly from Tiffanie Bolanos to give them a quick 2-0 lead. 

Two Seward errors in the 3^rd inning allowed Dodge City to pick up their first runs of the game to tie the game at 2, but the game didn't remain tied long as the Lady Saints got RBI singles from Hamilton and Oakden in the bottom half of the frame to take back their two run lead at 4-2. 

Both offenses slowed down after that as Dodge stranded runners in scoring position in each of the next two frames and Seward managed just one hit as the game remained 4-2 into the 6^th. 

Wagner got three quick groundouts in the top half of the 6^th inning to keep Seward in front and as they did in game one, the Lady Saints got their bats going with two outs in the bottom half of the 6^th.  The Lady Saints two out star, Clark, once again got the Lady Saints rally going with an RBI single and Danielle Orr followed that up with an RBI double to score her to make it 6-2.  The Lady Saints didn't stop there as Jaidyn Mawhinney picked up an RBI single to plate Orr and Kennedy Brunson used her wheels for an RBI knock to blow the game open to 8-2. 

Dodge put their leadoff man on in the 7^th, but Wagner slammed the door from there, getting three straight groundouts to get out of the inning and seal the 8-2 win for Seward. 

The Lady Saints had 14 hits in the victory while Dodge managed just 4.  Hamilton continued to swing a hot bat in the middle of the Lady Saints order, going 4 for 4 with an RBI and a run scored while Oakden picked up 3 hits and an RBI for Seward.  Wagner earned her league leading 14^th win of the year, going the distance and allowing 4 hits and 2 unearned runs while fanning 3. 

SEWARD COUNTY/DODGE CITY GAME TWO BOX SCORE

Lady Saints Head Coach Andrea Gustafson earned her 500^th win in Seward's game two victory, joining coincidentally her Wednesday counterpart Howie Smith as the only two active Region VI Division I Coaches with 500 or more wins. 

Seward remains red hot with the victories, winning their ninth and tenth straight contests to improve to 27-13 overall on the season.  Seward also remains in the top spot in Jayhawk West play after the first round of action at 10-2.  Dodge City drops to 20-12 overall and 7-7 in league action with the defeats. 

The Lady Saints continue a very busy schedule on Friday as they travel to Great Bend to take on Barton in a key Jayhawk West twinbill beginning at 2:00.