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Game 1 Box Score

Game 2 Box Score

COLUMBUS – The Capital University softball team remained in first place in the Ohio Athletic Conference Tuesday with a doubleheader sweep of Ohio Northern at Clowson Field.

The Crusaders (28-8 overall, 14-2 OAC) remain one game ahead of second-place John Carroll, which swept Baldwin Wallace Tuesday in University Heights.

With two wins Saturday against Otterbein, Capital would claim the conference championship outright and host the league tournament, which begins Friday, May 3.

Sophomore pitchers Brooke Billings (Clyde, Ohio) and Alyssa Patznick (Newark, Ohio) each tossed complete-game shutouts to lead the Crusaders.

Billings (13-4) tossed her fourth shutout of the season in the opener, allowing just two hits and three walks while striking out three. Patznick moved to 15-4 on the year in the nightcap, surrendering just four hits and three walks while striking out four in her first shutout of the campaign.

In the first game, Capital scored all three of its runs in the first two frames and outhit the Polar Bears (9-13, 8-8) by a 9-2 margin.

Senior shortstop Devan Boggs (West Jefferson, Ohio) led off the bottom of the first with a solo home run to right field, her league-leading 11th long ball of the season. Later in the inning, sophomore LeAnna Cotton (Okeechobee, Fla.) plated a run with a two-out single through the left side for her 24th RBI of the season.

Boggs, who finished 3-for-3 in the contest, struck again in the second inning, delivering a two-out, run-scoring single to left field to send senior right fielder Katie Neely (Sugar Grove, Ohio) to the plate.

Billings, who didn't allow a hit through four innings, stayed strong later in the contest, stranding runners in scoring position in the fifth and sixth innings before registering a 1-2-3 seventh to clinch the victory.

In the second affair, freshman second baseman Brooklyn Staten (Grove City, Ohio) supplied Patznick with all the run support she would need. Sophomore Maura Rose (Williamsport, Pa.) led off the second inning with a sharp single, and was then moved over to second on a bunt by Cotton. After a wild pitch moved Rose to third, Staten delivered with an RBI groundout to second base.

Patznick survived a scare in the top of the sixth, when Ohio Northern loaded the bases with one out. The right-hander, who walked two in the inning, got a strikeout and a fly ball to left to end the frame unscathed.

The Polar Bears brought the go-ahead run to the plate with two outs in the seventh but Patznick got a groundout to end the game.

The Crusaders host Bluffton for a non-conference doubleheader this Thursday at 3:30 p.m.