Box Score

JACKSONVILLE – The Jacksonville State softball team wrapped up its 2014 home schedule with a bang on Sunday, rolling to an 8-0 mercy-rule win and a series sweep over Belmont at University Field on Senior Day.
 
The Gamecocks (36-12, 20-4 Ohio Valley Conference) rattled off 11 hits in the game, one that saw them jump on the Bruins (12-32, 6-17 OVC) with a five-run first and never look back. Senior Tiffany Harbin has now tossed a shutout in her last six starts and has 12 on the year to take the national lead in that category. With her two-hitter of Belmont on Sunday, she has now thrown 40.2 consecutive scoreless innings against OVC opponents.
 
In her final regular season start at University Field, Harbin struck out nine Bruin batters to continue her dominance of OVC hitters in 2014. She earned the win to improve to 16-6 on the year and 12-2 against the OVC. In Conference play, she has a 0.75 earned run average and is holding opposing hitters to a 1.54 batting average while striking out 10.6 batters per seven innings. She has now been in the circle in 94 innings in league play, 88 of which have been shutout innings.
 
She got a little help from her fellow seniors on Senior Day after junior Sara Borders got the Gamecocks on the board with a two-run homer in the first. Her 13th homer of the year gave the Alexandria native the OVC lead and set the tone for the rest of the day.
 
Senior Kalee Tabor delivered the next big blow for JSU in her bases-loaded at bat later in the first. The Lake Mary, Fla., native drove Taylor Moon's 1-2 pitch into right center field to clear the bases and give her team a commanding 5-0 lead in the first.
 
Fellow senior Hayden Crawford also got in on the fun in the second inning. The Sparkman native stepped in with the bases loaded against Carolyn Snodgress and delivered a two-run double into left center on the first pitch she saw. The line drive that one hopped the fence gave JSU a 7-0 lead.
 
Senior Amanda Maldonado drove in the final JSU run in the fourth inning, thanks to a sac fly to left that scored Borders and set up a one-two-three top of the fifth from Harbin that secured the mercy-rule win.
 
Borders went 3-for-3 for her fifth three-hit game of the year and scored three runs to lead the JSU offensive attack. The three seniors in the lineup combined to go 4-for-6 with six RBI and a walk in their final regular season game at University Field. Tabor was 2-for-2 to lead that trio.
 
Kirbie Ferrell and Kat Hollingsworth each singled to account for all of Belmont's offense. Moon (7-12) suffered the loss for the Bruins after surrendering five runs on five hits despite recording just two outs in the first inning. Snodgress pitched the final 3.1 innings, allowing three runs on six hits in the process.
 
The Gamecocks will play a non-nonference game at Alabama State at 6 p.m. on Wednesday in Montgomery before wrapping up the regular-season with a three-game series at Eastern Kentucky this weekend. JSU enters the final weekend clinging to a slim lead for first place in the OVC standings, with the regular season champion earning the right to host the conference tournament from May 7-10.