Ciera Ashman and Lauren Nelson's six combined RBI helped #13 Cal State San Marcos softball overcome a 10-inning game one loss and a two hour rain delay to hand #1-ranked Cal Baptist just its second loss of the season on Tuesday.  CSUSM fell 6-5 in game one, but rebounded to win game two 7-4.

The game two win is the Cougars' 33^rd of the season, the most in the program's four year history.  CSUSM is now 33-13 this season, while Cal Baptist is 52-2.

Tuesday's games played out much differently than when these teams met back at the So-Cal Smash Tournament in February.  There, the Lancers won in convincing fashion, 12-1 and 7-3.

This time around, the Cougar lineup served immediate notice that they were ready to play, pounding three home runs in the first three inning of game one.  A three-run bomb by Erica Coelho in the second, followed by back-to-back shots by Ashman and Alyssa Dronenburg in the third gave CSUSM an early 5-1 lead.

But the Lancers struck back quickly, as Caty Reeves's two-run home run in the bottom of the third helped close the gap to 5-4.

In the fifth, a costly two-out error allowed the tying run to score off Cougar starting pitcher and NAIA wins leader Brenna Sandberg, who threw 9 1/3 innings, allowing four earned runs while striking out nine.

The game would proceed into extras, as Sandberg matched scoreless frames with CBU's Tory Ferreira, who entered in the third in relief and tossed 7 1/3 innings of one-hit ball. 

Even with the international tiebreaker in effect, both pitchers were able to escape the eighth and the ninth innings without any damage, until the Lancers' Briana Corral finally ended it with a one-out single in the tenth that scored Ashley Boyd.

Coming off that emotional loss and a rain delay that pushed the start of game two until after 9:00 PM, CSUSM showed little sign of wearing down.  On the contrary, the team proved its resilience, bouncing back from an early deficit.

After Ashman's second home run of the day put CSUSM up 1-0 in the top of the first, Cal Baptist tied it in the bottom of the frame, and took a 4-1 lead the following inning on a three-run home run by Boyd.

Despite the deficit, the Cougar offense would not let up, and a clutch two-out two-RBI single by Nelson cut the gap to 4-3 in the third. 

Then, with two on and two out in the fourth, Ferreira was called in again for CBU starter Melanie Ahumada.  In what was arguably the biggest play of the day, Ferreira would strike out Alicia Ingram on a ball in the dirt, but the speedy Ingram would get to first, and Mimi Krutein came in to score the tying run from third.  Ashman would then continue her huge day, capitalizing on the extra opportunity by ripping a two-RBI double that put the Cougars up 6-4.

That would be all Sandberg, who as usual pitched every inning of both games for the Cougars, would need.  She would not allow a runner to get into scoring position in the game's final three innings, and after Nelson singled home an insurance run in the seventh to make it 7-4, Sandberg worked a 1-2-3 bottom of the inning to close out the huge win.

Sandberg improves to 31-10 on the season with the game two win.  She allowed four runs in seven innings of work, striking out seven.

This is the third straight year that CSUSM has taken a game from Cal Baptist, who has been ranked #1 in all three occasions.

CSUSM will play its final regular season games at home against Hope International this Saturday.