Garza's walk-off two-run homer lifts Aggies over OSU

Texas A&M softball coach Jo Evans didn't put a call out for a home run, but she did predict the walk that set up Amber Garza's two-run walk-off homer.

Garza's opposite-field shot, her first game-ending long ball, gave the No. 22 Aggies a 4-2 victory over the No. 16 Oklahoma State Cowgirls and helped match a school-record 21-game home winning streak.

The win upped the Aggies' record to 38-13 overall and 10-5 in the Big 12, good for third, and put some distance between them and OSU, which fell to 37-13 and 8-6.

Tied at 2-2, designated player and cleanup hitter Meagan May, who had given the Aggies a 2-0 lead with her 11th home run of the season in the fourth inning, was scheduled to bat first in the seventh.

"I talked before the inning, saying 'Hey, Meagan is going to be willing to take a walk here,'" Evans said. "When I said it, I didn't know she was in the huddle. I thought she was warming up on the side."

May got ahead in the count as OSU reliever Sarah Odom (2-2) was pitching very carefully to last season's Big 12 home run leader with 24. Odom came back and then May fouled off a couple of pitches to stay alive before taking the walk by watching a changeup just miss the strike zone.

"She really dug in on that last pitch and held her ground, and that was the difference in the game to get that confidence to put a runner out there and then have us be a threat," Evans said. "Not looking at somebody has to hit a home run, that now somebody can hit a bleeder, or in the gap or out and you are going to win a ball game."

Kelsey Spittler bunted pinch-runner Kelsea Orsak over to second, setting up Garza's game winner.

"I just wanted to hit the ball on the ground into the outfield because I know Kelsea Orsak is fast enough to score, so I was telling myself 'Put the ball in play,'" Garza said. "I knew once Meagan got on we were going to score, Spitt is going to bunt her up in scoring position and we just got to get her in."

It was Garza's first look at the left-handed Odom, who came on in the sixth inning. She saw a lot of pitches, working the count full and then drove the ball over the left-center field fence for her seventh homer of the season.

"I feel like that's when you start hitting your home runs -- when you are not trying to hit home runs, when you are really trying to hit pitches where they are pitched," Evans said. "When we are going with pitches like Amber just did, that's why the ball had a chance to get out -- because she stayed right on it, had great discipline in that at bat, and she got enough looks in that location that when she got in that count she was able to drive the ball."

Garza's home run, her third in as many games, was only the Aggies' third hit, the first off Odom, who got out of a sixth-inning jam in which the A&M's Brittany Walker was on third with one out.

It also came after the Aggies put themselves in a mini-jam of their own in the top of the seventh.

Sammy Jo Diffendaffer popped up just in from the plate and with catcher Nicole Morgan and first baseman Rhiannon Kliesing converging, pitcher Melissa Dumezich called them off but then backed away, and the ball dropped for a single.

Dumezich then threw two balls before hitting OSU's Amy Graham, putting runners on first and second with one out and the top of the order coming to bat.

Dumezich (24-8) settled in and got Mariah Gearhart to pop up and Ari Morrison to fly out.

"In February, we might have panicked in that situation and lost a ballgame," Evans said. "Today we just said 'No big deal,' got their best hitter out, Gearhart. That leads them off and makes them go. I just thought our kids played with a lot of confidence in that situation and Mel didn't panic."

The confidence may come from not having lost at home all season, 19 games.

"It feels like such a great accomplishment, to be undefeated here," said Garza, a freshman third baseman. "To be playing in front of the 12th Man is an unbelievable feeling, a huge advantage."

A&M hasn't lost at the Aggie Softball Complex in more than a calendar year, with its last home loss to Missouri. The win tied the mark set in 2005.

"It's funny, I honestly didn't know about the streak, and after the Texas game somebody interviewed me and asked me and I was embarrassed because I didn't know, which is good because I'm superstitious, so I didn't want to be jinxing us," Evans said. "Today, I came here feeling like how special would this be for this ball club to be the one and for our fans to recognize that if you show up you are going to see a win. It's going to be rare not to see a win, and I want people to know that because people like to follow winners."

May's homer drove in Natalie Villarreal, who led off the fourth with a single for the Aggies' first base-runner of the game.

Chelsea Garcia homered to left-center, her 11th, knocking in Alysia Hamilton, who had singled to center to tie it at 2-2 in the sixth.

"This isn't meant to be cocky in any way, but we expect to win here," said Evans. "We show up here, we expect to leave with a win. I like coaching a team that has that attitude, has that swagger and goes out and gets it done."

A&M and OSU complete their two-game series at 1 p.m. Sunday.