SANTA CLARA, Calif. – Santa Clara softball dropped their series finale against LMU 8-2 on Senior Day but remained atop the West Coast Conference standings with a 9-3 league record alongside Saint Mary's.  The Gaels defeated San Diego on Sunday to sweep the series to move into a first place tie with Santa Clara. 

The conference title will be decided in the final weekend series coming up this Friday and Saturday.  Santa Clara will play at Oregon State while Saint Mary's will head down to LMU.  With Sunday's win over the Broncos, LMU sits in third place as they are still in contention for the league title with a 6-5 conference record.  They play Oregon State in Stockton, California on Monday as part of a makeup game before returning home to host Saint Mary's.  

While the Broncos lost, they took the series two games to one, to win their fourth straight WCC series for the first time in program history.  

Prior to the game, six Broncos seniors - Hope Alley, Lauren Bryson, Abigail Charpentier, Hannah Edwards, Bethany Shih and Alaina Valdez - were recognized.  

HOW IT HAPPENED:

• LMU's Jessica Hubbard allowed two runs on five hits in a complete game effort and the bats pounded out 14 hits against the Santa Clara (30-19, 9-3 WCC) pitching staff.  Arianna Jaurequi and Sakora Harvell combined for six of those hits, getting three apiece while Analiah Lummus drove in three runs.  
• The Lions (21-28, 6-5 WCC) did most of their damage in the middle innings with three runs in the third and four runs in the fourth.  
• With LMU already ahead 1-0 courtesy of Izzy Jamgotchian's RBI double in the first, Harvell and Lummus hit back-to-back singles with the bases loaded in the third inning to drive in three runs.  
• Rebecca Rubio stole home in the bottom of the third to get the Broncos on the board and cut into the LMU lead 4-1. 
• However, the Lions broke the game open in the next inning on Jaurequi's RBI double and Jasmine Sofowora's two-run home run to push the lead out to 8-1.   
• Hope Alley went 2-for-3 and drove in the only run for SCU against Hubbard who threw 108 pitches to improve to 8-14 on the season. 
• SCU starter Edwards was the losing pitcher allowing seven hits and four runs in three innings to drop to 8-5 on the year.  

NEXT UP:

• Santa Clara heads up to Corvallis, Oregon to face Oregon State in the final regular season series starting Friday.                  

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