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The Ohio State softball team is putting together one whale of a season, and it got even better this weekend.
The Buckeyes were one game behind Michigan when the two rivals took the field on Friday for a doubleheader in the Big Ten standings, but OSU swept both of those to take a one-game lead, then followed that up with a win via a grand slam walk-off run rule on Sunday. No. 24-ranked Ohio State now sits in fifth place in the league behind Oregon, UCLA, Nebraska, and Northwestern — two games ahead of the Wolverines, with Iowa and Washington all right there together.
How things ended on Sunday, though, had to send everyone away wanting more from this team.
Things didn’t start out great for Ohio State after Michigan plated four runs on a grand slam in the top of the first inning. However, OSU managed to get three runs back in the bottom of the inning on a Sami Bewick three-run homer, and just like that, things were still very much in doubt after just one full inning.
Things stayed that way until the top of the fourth inning when the Wolverines pushed the lead out to two runs at 5-3 with a sacrifice fly. The Buckeyes again responded with three runs of their own in the bottom of the fourth inning. Taylor Cruse doubled home two runs with one out before being brought home on a long fly off the wall by Hadley Parisien to put Ohio State up for the first time, 6-5.
The Buckeyes then broke things open in the bottom of the fifth inning with five runs. Cruse brought home another run on a sacrifice fly to the center field wall, scoring Kaitlyn Farley to extend the Buckeyes’ lead to 7-5. Then, OSU’s new home run queen hit a grand slam to become the program’s leader in RBIs for a single season, and suddenly, Ohio State was up 11-5 heading to the sixth inning.
Michigan tried to mount a comeback by scoring two runs in the top of the sixth on fielders’ choices, but Parisien came to the plate in the bottom of the inning with the bases loaded and ended things with a bomb to the opposite field to finish things with a 15-7 run rule victory, and a three-game weekend sweep.
With the win, Ohio State improves its record to 37-10-1 overall and 11-5 in the conference. It’ll next be in action against Ohio on Tuesday before hosting Purdue for a three-game weekend series beginning Friday.
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