(Photo: Liesl Babicka/WCSN)
With one out and Morgan Howe on first base, Danielle Gibson stepped up to the plate in the bottom of the seventh inning. Arizona pitcher Taylor McQuillin only needed two more outs to push the game into extra innings.
However, Gibson had a completely different idea. With just one pitch Gibson swung away, hitting the ball into the gap between left and centerfield.
The Arizona players chased down the ball that seemed to get stuck in the crevice of the fencing as Howe got the sign to keep running to home. Howe hit home plate and Gibson ended the game on second.
Gibson’s walk-off double led No. 8 Arizona State softball team to a 2-1 victory over No. 13 Arizona Friday night.
“It was exciting, if I had to replay it in my head I couldn’t because I was so excited,” said Howe. “When I saw Gibby hit the ball, I thought this is it, this is going to be big right here, I understand the hype now, I understand the rivalry.”
“Gibby’s been nails all year long, she’s fun to watch, she’s fun to watch compete, she just lives for these moments and we’re so excited she’s a Devil,” said head coach Trisha Ford.
At the beginning of the game, an ASU win looked questionable. Centerfielder Ashleigh Hughes began strong for the Wildcats with a leadoff home run against G Juarez to give them a 1-0 lead early on.
“I just let it go right away, it’s the beginning of the game, I know they are going to score that’s a scoring kind of team, they battle, that’s their job,” said Juarez. “I let it go and I focused on us and the game.”
Juarez would then shut down the Wildcat offense for the rest of the night only allowing two more hits and striking out 13 batters.
“The first few innings we seemed down, some of our teammates were like ‘Look we are only down 1-0, it’s really no big deal, we’ve scored way more runs than just one,’” said Gibson. “We really had to stay in our dugout and have our energy and have good at-bats and we ended up doing that.”
The Sun Devils went a full three innings without a single hit. McQuillin was throwing a no-hitter until the fourth inning when Kindra Hackbarth hit a leadoff home run into right field to tie the game 1-1.
Hackbarth’s home run is only her second of the season, her first being a grand slam.
“I saw and heard contact and I thought there is no way and I saw it go over and it was a deep ball, so I was jumping up and down and pointing at G to have G’s back because she’s throwing a heck of a game,” said Hackbarth. “We all need to have G’s back and in order to have G’s back we got to hit.”
ASU had two hits on the night, both giving the Sun Devils a single run. McQuillin was far from a poor outing in Tempe as she struck out 10 batters, hence the slow offensive night for ASU.
Marisa Stankiewicz and the Sun Devil defense played a pivotal role in the win against Arizona.
In the first inning, the Wildcats had two runners on when Malia Martinez hit a drive to Stankiewicz. She dove to get the ball and flipped her glove to throw the ball to Jade Gortarez at second base to make the third and final out.
“That was huge, that was SportsCenter-esque, she dove, and I think tossed the ball at the same time and Jade to be ready for it, anticipating it, this game is full of you get lucky and you make big plays when it’s time to make big plays and I think that was huge,” said Ford.
Hackbarth also had a close run with the outfield wall to catch a ball that seemed on its way out of the ballpark.
“We already have one win under belt so it’s like whether we sweep them or whether we win the series, we have to come out tomorrow and play our game,” said Gibson. “I think that this gives us confidence and it’s going to feed into tomorrow.”
The Territorial Cup series is far from over as there are two more games left to be played. ASU and Arizona head back to Farrington on Saturday afternoon with a 2 p.m. start.
