“Sunday is just a gritty day,” ace Lyndsey Grein said after the Ducks rode the coattails of her dominant day out in the circle. She shut-down the Wolf Pack offense, only allowing three runs over her time in the circle on Sunday afternoon, propelling the Ducks to take the final game of the Jane Sanders Classic.

No. 18 Oregon softball (18-7) finished up its last non-conference tournament on Sunday afternoon with a 7-3 win over the University of Nevada Wolf Pack (16-9). The Ducks were able to bounce back after their shaky day yesterday behind Grein, who got her first start of the tournament and did what she always does: shut down the opposing offense. The Oregon offense was able to put up 7 runs, though it was mostly quiet after the first. Oregon had found the success they wanted to end on in the last non-conference game before beginning Big Ten play.

Grein (6.2 IP, 3 R, 4 K) got the nod to start a game for the first time in the Jane Sanders Classic. Up to this point she had been working purely out of the bullpen to keep the Ducks in the game. In the first inning, Grein let up a 2-run homerun that only got out of the park because the ball hit Ducks centerfielder Ayanna Shaw’s glove on her way up to catch it and bounced over the fence. What looked to be a hard hit, lineout to deep center field instead gave the Wolf Pack a 2-0 lead. 

“I knew my teammates were going to have my back,” Grein said about giving up the first inning homerun. “The next thing I can do is just have the right approach to what I’m doing next.”

After the double-header yesterday, Oregon head coach Melyssa Lombardi said that she wanted to see the ‘three cylinders’ working today: offense, defense and pitching. The top of the first were  rocky starts for cylinders two and three, and cylinder one was going to have to be firing to keep the Ducks back in the game.

That cylinder fired in the bottom of the inning, as the Ducks got on the board after stringing together a couple of hits. Kaylynn Jones roped a double down the left field line to score Shaw, Rylee McCoy came through with the bases loaded and drove in Jones and Elon Butler, Emma Cox punched a single through the infield to score Amari Harper, Katie Flannery did the same to score McCoy. The Ducks put up a five-spot in the first and led 5-2.

“Just getting on base,” McCoy said about the offense early on. “Getting as many doubles as we can, finding gaps, getting singles, scoring runs in different ways.”

The defense and pitching cylinders kicked in after the first. Grein shut down the Wolf Pack, only giving up one hit, a triple, that fell because Nevada left fielder Madison Clark beat the shift. The Oregon infield was showing its range, making plays up the middle and in foul ground.

“I thought the three showed up,” Lombardi said about if the three cylinders were strong today. 

After Oregon got another run in the second with a Stefini Ma’ake single that scored Butler, the third gave the Ducks the opportunity to add on and put the game to bed. With the bases loaded and one out, Harper hit a screaming line drive right to Nevada second baseman Saige Alfaro, who flipped to shortstop Haylee Engelbrecht to double off Jones. 

Grein, through the first five innings, held the Wolf Pack to only those two runs in the first, and three hits overall. Despite the workload that she had been given over the weekend, the senior competed well against a tough Wolf Pack offense. 

“Championship Sunday, everybody’s feeling a little bit of something,” Grein said about being able to compete as well as she did with the workload she’s had. “I think everybody just had the approach that if we’re going to come out, we’re going to win it.”

The Ducks got another run on the board after a mental error from Alfaro at second. A two-out groundball from Butler plated Taryn Ho from third because Alfaro fired home to nab Ho at the plate. But Nevada catcher Karolyn Glover was not set up for a tag play, assuming that since there were two outs Alfaro was going to throw to first, and Ho scored without a play at the plate. 

Grein went back out to the circle in the seventh, the second time in as many days that the Oregon starter went into the seventh inning. For an Oregon pitching staff that was having a very rough tournament outside of freshman Maddie Milhorn, the performance from Grein gave the rest of the staff a much-needed rest.

Milhorn came into the game to get the final out after Grein gave up a solo blast to dead center field from Bailie Clark. Milhorn drew a flyout and Oregon pulled out a 7-3 win in the rematch against the Wolf Pack.

“I felt like at that point she had done everything we had asked her to do,” Lombardi said about pulling Grein with just one out left. “I should have probably (taken) her out sooner.”

Oregon will begin conference play next Friday with a home series against Penn State. Games will be broadcast on Big Ten + (video) and KWVA (Radio).