The Wichita State softball team faced Southern Illinois in Carbondale, Ill., in a double header Saturday and a third game Sunday. 

The Shockers fell behind quickly in Saturday’s first game, giving up a run in four consecutive innings. Melanie Jaegers singled to start the Shockers off in the sixth, followed by singles from Ali Vandever, Laura Vickers and Hayley Temple to eventually score Jaegers and put WSU on the scoreboard. After a pitching error that advanced all runners, Vandever strolled in for another score. Brianne Bond doubled up the first base line to clear the bases and tie up the game.

In the seventh inning, WSU kept the momentum going with another single from Temple. Jaeger scored to give WSU the lead. Bond was walked to load the bases and Erin Carney singled to allow Vickers to score. Temple tried to score from second base, but was thrown out to end the at-bat for WSU with a two-run lead.

However, Southern Illinois would not go down in the bottom of the seventh, lifted by a homerun from Jayna Spivey. 

After SIU’s Allie VadeBoncouer was hit by starting WSU pitcher Katie Armagost, she was later batted in on an RBI walk-off single from Kalyn Harker. The Shockers dropped the first game in a heartbreaking fashion, despite out-batting the SIU Salukis. 

In the second game of the afternoon, WSU’s defense couldn’t keep up with SIU. Until the bottom of the fourth inning, it looked to be another highly contested game. The game sat at four all before the Salukis scored four more in back-to-back innings. 

They scored another two runs in the bottom of the sixth to gain victory by run rule.

The Shockers, however, refused to be swept, as they let their defense do some talking and kept SIU scoreless through four innings while scoring five runs of their own in the final game. 

SIU would not go quietly, though, and made a run in the bottom of the fifth inning to score two and cut the Shocker lead to three.

Brittany Fortner added an RBI-double in the sixth to score Temple and lifted the Shockers to a 6-2 win. Shockers head to Stillwater, Okla., to play Oklahoma State on Wednesday.