San Diego State softball came away with a 7-5 victory over Northern Illinois on Friday night at the SDSU Softball Field, following a walk-off two-run homerun in the bottom of the seventh inning by sophomore infielder Kelsey Munoz.
The Aztecs were ahead throughout the game until the top of the seventh inning when Sam Schmidt of Northern Illinois tied up the game at 5-5 with a three-run homerun.
SDSU head coach Kathy Van Wyk said she did not need to tell her team anything when they came into the dugout in the bottom of the seventh inning.
“This team knows what they need to do when they get up to the plate and they do not panic,” Van Wyk said. “They have great confidence in themselves as a team.”
Three out of SDSU’s five wins so far have been walk-off hits.
Munoz was the hero in the bottom of the seventh inning after her line drive home run sailed over the left-center field fence.
“I came up to the plate, knew I needed to adjust to the new pitcher, and get the job done, which meant doing whatever I needed to do to get on base,” Munoz said.
The Aztecs took advantage of any opportunity they had on offense to score runs throughout the game.
Alicia Garcia, a junior transfer from Palomar College, used her opportunity to earn her first career home run in the bottom of the second inning.
“(It) was awesome not only having my first home run at home but also having my first home run as a D1 athlete,” Garcia said.
Van Wyk said she was pleased with the performance of the team so far in the Campbell/Cartier Classic tournament, and looks to fine tune the team to eventually be fully prepared to compete against Mountain West Conference opponents.
“We had some good and some bad moments as a team but they are all just early season miscues that we will learn from,” Van Wyk said. “Tonight’s game was exactly how games go against teams in our conference; back and forth score, good hitting, solid defense.”
Van Wyk said she is excited for this year’s team and looks to “get the bad taste out of their mouths,” from last year.
SDSU will finish up the Campbell/Cartier Classic with a doubleheader on Feb. 16 against UC Santa Barbara and Grand Canyon University.
