The softball team beat the Lassen College Cougars at home in a doubleheader on Tuesday. The first game started at 12 p.m. with the Hawks defeating the Cougars 12-4. The second game at 2 p.m. also ended in a Hawks victory, with the final score 8-0.

This conference series was their last preseason games before the conference season officially starts on Feb. 24 at home against the Panthers of Sacramento City College.

“It’s nice to get that little confidence going into conference, our team played some solid softball,” Head Coach Kristy Schroeder said. “We just got to focus on things that we can control, we do that we can compete in every game.”

In the second game, Hawks pitcher/first baseman Gabrielle Montaie started and finished all six innings. She has been struggling in the past few games, but
had her redemption when she threw a no-hitter.

“Honestly I feel great I actually didn’t know that I had a no-hitter, because I remember one girl getting a hit, but then we got it out,” Montaie said.

Montaie’s performance was exceptional with the first inning being a scoreless inning and the Hawks held onto their winning momentum to start off strong. She threw a total of 12 strikes with three strikeouts.

In the bottom of the second inning, Cougars pitcher/first base Sabrina Johnson tried to strikeout the Hawks, but outfielder Cassandra Thomas hit a single and second baseman Veronica Smith was able to the first point of the game.

The Hawks scored three more points in the second inning making it 4-0.

“We just kept our good energy from our last inning, and we kept it going into the second and we all came together.” Center Fielder Amber Wright said.

The Hawks were up to bat in the bottom of the third inning, and they added on to their lead with second baseman Veronica Smith hitting a triple and center

Hannah Flynn knock a single for Smith to score. With outfielder Devyn Nichols on first base, Thomas gets her second triple of the game that brought Nichols in for a scor making it 6-0 going into the fourth inning.

“We had more energy, even though we didn’t run over them in the beginning, but we all stayed together,” Montaie said.

Starting off the sixth inning, Thomas got her third hit of the day with a single towards center field. Shortstop Korina Krueg hits a single and Thomas scores from first base. With two Hawks at first and third base, first baseman Ashlee Kaiser made an error to hit a single which led to an out, but Wright gets to score the final point making the score 8-0.

The Hawks closed game two in six innings, giving Coach Schroeder a confident mindset for the conference season.

“The thing that I liked about today is that we hit the ball pretty well, we scored runners when we had opportunities,” Schroeder said. “We didn’t had luck on our side in certain situations, but it’s nice to [get] some wins.”