NWAC SOFTBALL CHAMPIONSHIPS: Cardinals power past Lower Columbia, into semis

PORTLAND — Three wins down, two to go.

Sophomore Hayden Rockwell homered twice, Kennedy Hobson had four hits and six RBIs for top-seeded North Idaho College in a 15-9 win over the fourth-seeded Lower Columbia Red Devils in a quarterfinal game in the Northwest Athletic Conference tournament at Delta Park on Friday.

NIC (43-2) faces second-seeded Mt. Hood (44-4) in a semifinal game today at 10 a.m.

"We were able to do a little bit of everything offensively," NIC coach Shay Chapman said. "The top of our lineup had a lot of power, and the bottom was able to play a bit of a short game. Lower Columbia's a good team."

Mt. Hood handed NIC its last loss, winning 8-6 in a crossover tournament on March 9.

"We were still trying to find our groove in March," Chapman said. "We've had to work through some failures, but have been getting better each day. We've got one thing on our mind and we're really champing at the bit to play them again. We're hoping to give them a different game than they saw in March."

Lower Columbia took a 2-0 lead in the top of the first inning. After tying the game at 2-2 on an RBI single by Summer Makinster in the second, NIC took the lead for good on a two-run single by Hobson in the second inning. Rockwell followed with a two-run home run to make it 6-2, part of a five-run inning.

"Lower Columbia was hitting the ball pretty hard and we were making some errors that we haven't been," Chapman said. "We had some pressure that we hadn't felt in a while, and I was happy that we were able to capitalize."

Lower Columbia    200    510    1    —    9    11    1

North Idaho        157    110    x    —    15    15    4

Alli Heater, Teeghan Reams (4) and Sawyer Stenson; Kristine Schmidt and Corine Doran.

HITS: LCC — Grumbois 3, Russell, Stenson, Aspaas, Eder, Loose 3, Twitty. NIC — Hobson 4, Rockwell 2, Korok, Doran 2, Vieira 2, Schulhauser, Nichols, Makinster 2. 2B — Russell, Loose, Hobson, Schulhauser. 3B — Grumbois. HR — Grumbois, Loose, Hobson, Rockwell 2, Korok, Vieira.

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