VANCOUVER – Playing just one final game due to weather, the UBC Thunderbirds lost 9-8 to Eastern Oregon in Cascade Collegiate Conference play on Saturday afternoon at Peggy Anderson Field, allowing the Mountaineers to sweep the series.
 
EOU (6-15, 5-4 CCC) trailed most of the game and were behind 8-3 entering the bottom of the sixth but rallied with a six-run inning to shock the Thunderbirds (3-10, 2-4 CCC).
 
UBC jumped out to an impressive 5-0 lead in the first inning.
 
Olivia Malesku, Taylore Jones and Mia Valcke loaded the bases to start the game with a single, walk, and single respectively. The next batter Cassa Courtney opened the scoring with a sacrifice fly to left field. Hanna Hansen re-loaded the bases with a walk. Two batters later, Nicole Salas singled through the left side to bring home two runs. Emily Chorpita followed up with an RBI single to right to make it 4-0. Jordan Britten-Yung knocked in the final run of the inning with a single to centre field.
 
In the second, Courtney hit a sacrifice fly, her second of the game, to left field foul territory to plate Jones before EOU responded with a run in the home half of the inning as freshman Mandy Fetters drew a bases-loaded walk for the Mountaineers.
 
Salas scored for UBC in the top of the third to give her team a 7-1 advantage, while the Mountaineers were able to get one of their own in the home half of the inning thanks in part to two T-Birds errors.
 

The teams added a run each in the fourth, with the UBC one coming on a Hansen home run to right centre, the first of her university career.
 
EOU's six-run sixth inning included four hits and four walks. The T-Birds got a runner to second in the seventh inning but a pair of lineouts ended the game.
 
Salas led UBC with a 4-for-4 day with two runs and two RBI. Britten-Yung and Hansen had two hits apiece. Hansen also drew two walks.
 
The Thunderbirds will host Northwest (Wash.) Tuesday afternoon in a CCC doubleheader at Softball City in Surrey, starting at 3 p.m.