Lady Jackets Post Senior Day Shutouts (4/22/06)
Game 1 Box Score
Game 2 Box Score
Game Photos

BILLINGS, MT – Montana State-Billings seniors Christy Wankel and Anna Henderson played their final games at Cenex Stadium on Saturday, and their teammates made sure they went out winners.  The Yellowjackets swept Lincoln University in a pair of shutouts, 6-0 and 4-0, to close out the 2006 regular season.  Freshman pitchers Rebekah Tsatsa and Terina Stacks gave up just a combined seven hits in the two complete-game victories.

The Yellowjackets improved to 19-29 overall and finished their first season as a member of the Heartland Conference at 12-12.  The Jackets posted a 13-1 home record for the season.  MSU Billings will be the No. 5 seed in next week’s Heartland Conference Tournament in San Antonio.  They will face the No. 4 seed in the opening round.  Western New Mexico is currently in fourth place, but could move up in the standings pending Saturday’s other conference games.

The Yellowjackets scored in each of the first four innings of the first game and Tsatsa was on cruise control on the rubber.  Tsatsa (Fr., Eagle, ID) scattered four hits over seven innings and struck out a career-high nine batters to improve to 6-7.  She benefited from an efficiently productive Yellowjacket offense that plated six runs on just eight hits.

Rachel Quarnburg (Jr., Billings, MT) gave Tsatsa all the run support she would need when she homered with two outs in the bottom of the first inning.  The Jackets added two runs in the second on a Jessica Frank (So., Great Falls, MT) double to the gap.  An Aysha Maddox (Jr., Richland, WA) RBI groundout in the third inning and a two-run home run from Stephanie Gosselin (Fr., Brentwood Bay, BC) in the fourth capped the scoring.  Gosselin’s homer was the first of her collegiate career.

Seven different players accounted for the Jackets’ eight hits in the game.  Frank was the only player on either side of the card to record multiple hits, going 2-for-3 with two RBI and a run scored.  Wankel (Great Falls, MT) and Henderson (Frenchtown, MT) were each 1-for-3.  The Blue Tigers’ Tracy Reyland took the loss, allowing four earned runs, striking out four, and walking three.

MSU Billings out-hit the Blue Tigers 10-3 in the second game, giving Stacks (Fr., Washougal, WA) the complete-game victory.  She struck out eight with just one walk to improve to 6-9.  Even though she has ranked in the top 10 in the conference for earned run average for much of the year, Stacks lost her first nine decisions of the season.  She has since won six-straight. 

Stacks also was the beneficiary of Yellowjacket home runs.  Megan Moeller (Jr., Ontario, OR) hit her second of the year to lead off the third inning.  Two batters later Quarnburg hit her team-leading eleventh dinger of the season.  The Jackets gave Stacks a pair of insurance runs in the sixth inning when Moeller hit a two-RBI single to centerfield, scoring Frank and Stacks.

Moeller was 2-for-3 in the game with three RBI and a run.  Gosselin was 2-for-4 from her leadoff spot, and Quarnburg was 2-for-2.  Quarnburg has now homered in four of the last five games and five of the last seven.  Reyland again took the loss to fall to 7-16.