ELMHURST, Ill. - The Elmhurst University softball team earned their first conference sweep of the season Saturday afternoon, taking down North Park in both games of a senior day twinbill.

Elmhurst (13-21, 4-10 CCIW) held on for a narrow 2-1 victory in the opener, before slugging it out with the Vikings (10-24, 5-9 CCIW) in game two and separating in the sixth inning for an 11-5 win in the nightcap.

The Bluejays honored their lone senior member of the class of 2024, Lauren Polich, in between the two games today. Polich made the most of h a pair of senior day starts, going 1-for-3 and working a pair of walks in her final games at Salt Creek Park.

In the opener, a strong pitching performance from Emma Lenczewski (6.1 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 4 K) and clutch hitting in the late stretch gave Elmhurst their first win of the day. The Jays took a 1-0 lead in the fourth inning thanks to an Ali Mockenhaupt single, and another single off the bat of the lefty in the sixth inning gave the Bluejays a 2-0 advantage. 

In the seventh, after a leadoff triple and a sacrifice fly cut the deficit to one, Mockenhaupt came in the game with a runner on first and just one out. From there, the left-hander was able to get a fly out and a ground out back to herself to secure her second save of the season and a 2-1 Bluejay victory.

The bats were the story of game two, as both teams combined for 16 runs and 24 hits in a game that was two and a half hours long. The Bluejays would jump out to a 5-0 through 2.5 innings, leading with production up and down the lineup. Bailey Proffitt started out with a sacrifice fly in the first, and back-to-back singles from Chiara O'Leary and Grace Hayes in the second would put Elmhurst up by four, with a Brenna Morley single increasing it to five. 

The Vikings would get three runs back in the third, and another two in the fourth to knot the game at five, a score that stood through five innings. That's when the floodgates would open for the Jays in the sixth, with a five-run, five-hit inning. Gianna Amundsen got into scoring position with a single and a stolen base, being knocked in by an RBI single from O'Leary who would advance all the way to third on the throw home. Another RBI single from Hayes would follow, and later in the inning Maddie Kriech would send two runners home with a single followed by another Morley RBI single to make it 10-5 Elmhurst. 

The Bluejays would get another run in the seventh after O'Leary reached base on a fielding error, and the left-hander would finish the game in the circle in the bottom half of the inning to earn the win as well.

UP NEXT

Elmhurst will set their sights on their final conference series of the season next Sunday, May 5, heading to Rock Island, Ill. for a doubleheader at Augustana beginning at 1:00 p.m.

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