The Metro State softball team awaits its seed in the NCAA Division II tournament after dominating the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Tournament. The Roadrunners claimed the RMAC title with an 8-0 victory in five innings over Mesa State (27-19) on Saturday at Auraria Field. Metro was undefeated in the conference tournament.
The Roadrunners (40-10), ranked No. 13, were ranked second in the Central Region in the latest regional poll. The softball team is in only its second season after it was shut down after the 1990 season, and the win over Mesa gave Metro 40 victories for the first time in school history.
Jennessa Tesone and Jessica Haab homered in the game, the Roadrunners’ 97th and 98th homers of the season, which tied a D-II record set by Mesa in 2001 and equaled by Arkansas-Monticello in 2007.
Starting pitcher Christie Robinson (25-4) went the distance, giving up four hits and walking none. Haab, Tesone, Danni Hedstrom and Tara Mickelson each had two RBIs.
Alvarado wins in Vegas.
Junior welterweight Mike Alvarado of Denver continued to impress, and with a spotless record, as he defeated Juaquin Gallardo (18-8-1, 5 KOs) of Oakland, Calif., by unanimous decision in the fifth bout on the Manny Pacquiao-Ricky Hatton undercard.
Alvarado is 26-0 with 18 knockouts. He began pressing the action in the second round and scored a knockdown with a hard right hand. That prompted Gallardo to adopt a very defensive strategy, but Alvarado continued to use his right hand to good effect, landing good punches in spite of Gallardo’s efforts to elude him.
One judge scored the fight 79-72 and the other two 80-71.
Frogs win MWC golf, Rams fifth.
Texas Christian won a team playoff with San Diego State on the first extra hole to win the men’s Mountain West Conference championship.
The Horned Frogs and Aztecs set a league championship record with their 8-under-par 844 totals. Colorado State was fifth at 854. Wyoming was seventh (873) and Air Force was eighth (875).
New Mexico’s Steve Saunders won the individual championship at 9-under 204, an MWC record, and his four-shot margin over UNLV’s Ji Moon was also a record. Phil Henzlik of Wyoming was tied for seventh at 212.
Thunderwolves win RMAC Plains Division.
The Colorado State-Pueblo baseball team swept a home doubleheader from Colorado Mines, 5-0 and 6-4, and clinched the RMAC Plains Division.
The sweep also secured the second seed in next week’s RMAC Tournament.
Mario Mattivi blanked Mines for six innings in the opener, and J.C. Urso and Jesus Hernandez completed the shutout, the first for the Thunderwolves since March 2006. In the nightcap, the Thunderwolves scratched back from a 4-0 deficit to tie the game in the fifth on Tony Pechek’s RBI double and Jason Forbes’ RBI single. Pechek and Forbes each had RBI doubles in the bottom of the sixth, and Hernandez picked up his seventh save with a scoreless seventh inning.
• Tony Frikken went 3-for-4 with four RBIs to lead Metro State to an 8-5 win in the first game of a doubleheader with host New Mexico Highlands.
The Roadrunners lost the nightcap 12-2.
• Chris Steinbeck had three doubles and three RBIs, and Jesus Arzaga, Gerard Mohrmann, Mike Benton and J.T. Putt each hit home runs as Regis defeated host Nebraska-Kearney 19-10 in the opener of a doubleheader. Steinbeck homered in the nightcap as the Rangers won 6-5.
