EUGENE, Ore – Taylor Medley crushed a three-run walk-off homer in her final career at bat, capping off an epic senior day sweep for the Northwest Christian University softball team as they defeated Carroll College, 8-7 and 7-4.
 
Carroll, who finished in first place in the CCC-East Division finishes the regular season 22-20 with an 11-13 mark in the conference. The Beacons, who missed the final playoff spot by one game, end their campaign at 17-33, 11-17 in the CCC. It was the highest overall win total for the Beacons since 2010, giving fourth-year head coach Julie Strand her finest finish.
 
Game one provided plenty of fireworks as the Saints jumped out quickly with two runs in the top of the first inning on an RBI single from Megan Gipe and a double-steal that resulted in Tianna Sell crossing the dish.
 
NCU responded in a big way, scoring five runs on six hits in the bottom of the first. The biggest blow came off the bat of Kiara Vasquez who hit a bases-clearing single to left field as a pair of miscues by the outfielder resulted in three runs coming across.
 
Carroll rallied to tie the game at 5-5 in the top of the second on an RBI single from senior Justine Taylor followed by a two-run single by Allison Bayer.
 
The Beacons took the lead back in the bottom of the second, putting up a three-spot of their own thanks to three doubles in the inning from Ashlee Cole, Vasquez, and Kyndle DelCollo.
 
The 8-5 lead would be enough, but barely. Carroll added a run in the sixth and another in the seventh, both unearned, but reliever Madi Jones finished her three-inning performance out of the bullpen allowing just two hits and striking out three batters to record NCU's first save of the season.
 
Katie Walker (5-11) started and got the win, allowing four earned runs in four innings of action.
 
Gipe (7-9) took the loss for the Fighting Saints, allowing five earned runs on ten hits over the first two innings. Tess Eaton gave a strong performance in relief, shutting out the Beacons on three hits over the final four innings.
 
Game two began as a strong pitching duel between Carroll starter Mackenna Landis and NCU starter Sarah Lawhorn as no runs scored over the first 3 ½ innings.
 
The Beacons were the first team to break through, getting a pair of runs in the fourth. Jessica Garner came home on a wild pitch and Cole later scored on a throwing error when Carroll attempted to pick her off of third.
 
NCU held the lead until the sixth when Carroll scored three runs, all unearned. Taylor Otswald and Kaydee Parsons produced back-to-back doubles after an error to do the bulk of the damage.
 
Trailing 3-2, Northwest Christian once again took the lead in the bottom of the sixth, scoring two more runs. In similar fashion to their first couple, Garner came home on a passed ball and Cole scored on a wild pitch and the Beacons went ahead 4-3.
 
Down to their final out, Carroll knotted the game in the seventh inning and the game continued into the eighth where Medley produced one of the best moments of the season for NCU, blasting the ball over the left field fence for the game-winner.
 
In her final pitching appearance, Lawhorn went 5.2 innings without allowing an earned run. Janieve Boyles (5-11) got the victory in relief, allowing just one hit over the final 2.1 innings.
 
For Carroll, Mackenna Landis threw the first 5.2 innings, allowing two earned runs on six hits while striking out three. Ashley Davis (2-4) allowed three runs over the final 2.1 innings but struck out five batters.
 
The Fighting Saints move on to the CCC Championship Tournament in two weeks. NCU's campaign comes to a close.
 
The end of the season brought with it a number of record clinching performances for the Beacons. Cole continued her reached-safely streak, extending it to 22 games as she went 3-for-5 with five runs and three walks. Cole set a number of records for the Beacons on the season including home runs (14), runs batted in (37) extra base hits (25), total bases (91) and walks (30). She also clobbered a few sabermetric statistics as well, setting new single-year standards for on-base percentage (.493), slugging percentage (.843) and OPS (1.336). The previous school record for OPS was 1.187, set by Tina Houtz in 2001.
 
Also tying a single-season record on Saturday was freshman Jessica Garner who posted two more stole bases to bring her yearly cumulative to 15.
 
The Beacons set multiple team records as well including total games (48), home runs (33) and walks (126).
 
Also ending careers on Saturday were Miriham Walle and Kaeli Massetto. Walle put some punctuation on the end of hers with a spectacular diving catch in left field during game two. Massetto had a pair of hits on the day.
 
Saturday was also the finale for Parker Fritter who completed a career that saw her own new NCU all-time records for Home Runs (35) and Runs Batted in (120). She lands in the top-five all-time in ten other offensive categories.