PALO ALTO, Calif. ? Missy Penna struck out 11 and No. 5/5 Stanford held off a late charge from Portland State for a 10-3 win in NCAA Regional action on Friday night at Boyd and Jill Smith Family Stadium.
The Cardinal, the No. 8 national seed in the 64-team tournament, put up five runs before the Vikings closed to within two, 5-3, in the sixth.
Stanford (45-9) advances to play Nevada at 12:00 p.m. tomorrow, while PSU (29-25) will face No. 22/22 Cal Poly (39-11) at 3:00 p.m. in an elimination game. The Mustangs were a 4-1 loser to Nevada in the early game today.
The Cardinal put a run across in the bottom of the first, before tacking on three more in the next inning, all coming with two outs.
With runners at second and third, Alissa Haber singled back up the middle to plate a pair of runs, and then Haber scored one batter later on Ashley Hansen's double to right center.
After Stanford added another run in the fourth, PSU finally broke through with two outs in the top of the fifth on two-straight hits. Arielle Wiser started the rally by drilling a shot off the base of the left field fence and then came around to score on Jamee Rauch's bloop single to shallow left to make it 5-1.
The Vikings continued their rally in the sixth, scoring two runs on two hits and two hit batters. They loaded the bases, with Brandi Scoggins getting hit in the back to reach first, and Jenna Wilson and De'Chauna Skinner both singling up the middle. Penna then hit Becca Diede to bring home Scoggins from third.
With two outs, Rauch hit a grounder to Hansen at shortstop and she decided to go to second base to try and get Diede. But Diede slid in just ahead of second baseman Maddy Coon touching the base and Wilson scored to make it 5-3.
Stanford extended its lead in their half of the inning, scoring five runs on six hits to go up 10-3.
Wiser and Wilson led PSU with two hits apiece.
Haber and Hansen each recorded three hits and drove in three runs for the Cardinal, who finished with 13 hits as a team.
Penna pitched the first six innings, allowing six hits, three runs and walking two to improve to 32-6.
"We showed a lot of fight coming back on them," said Portland State first year Head Coach Tobin Echo-Hawk. "We could have just rolled over being down by five runs, but we didn't. I'm very proud of the way the girls kept fighting all game."
GAME NOTES: Wiser's double was the VIkings 65th of the year, tying the PSU team single-season record ... Wiser is riding a five-game hitting streak ... Nichole Latham, who started and then later came back in the game in relief, took the loss for PSU, giving up eight hits and five runs in 4 1/3 innings ... All three of Hansen's hits were doubles ... The Vikings are now 1-3 all-time in the NCAA Division I Tournament ... Rauch collected the 166th hit of her career to move into a tie for 10th place in the PSU record book.
