SPOKANE, Wash. - Whitworth completed a four-game sweep of visiting George Fox by taking both ends of a Northwest Conference softball doubleheader on Sunday afternoon at Marks Field. The Pirates (17-3 overall, 12-0 NWC) beat the Bruins (5-17, 3-11) 13-3 in the opener (5 innings) and 8-1 in the nightcap.

Heather Case had a career day for Whitworth, belting three home runs and driving in seven RBIs. Her three home runs today give her 13 for her career, a new Whitworth record. Halley Cey and Sara Rylaarsdam also had four hits each for the Bucs. Kerstyn Tsuruda had three hits and scored twice for George Fox.

Case hit 3 home runs, threw a complete game

Game 1: Whitworth 13, George Fox 3 (5 inn.) - Box score
Whitworth scored all the runs the Pirates would need with an 11-run first inning. The Pirates sent 16 batters to the plate against a pair of Bruin pitchers. Meanwhile, Whitworth pitcher Jessie LaPlante improved to 10-0 this season.

After Cey opened the first with a single and Lacey Parry walked, Case drove a ball deep over the left field fence for a 3-0 lead. Rylaarsdam added a two-run single later in the inning to make the score 5-0. Six different batters followed with RBI hits, including Cey and Case in their second at-bats of the inning.

George Fox pulled within 11-3 in the third inning. Kayla Winkler had an infield hit for an RBI and Nikki Morrison scored on a throwing error by the catcher.

The Pirates added two more runs in the fourth, including an RBI single by Carrie Gibson.

LaPlante allowed three runs (two earned) on five hits with seven strikeouts and no walks in her five innings of work. The Bruins' Tory Weatherman, who pitched only one-third of an inning, took the loss to fall to 1-5 this season.

Parry hit her first home run of the year

Game 2: Whitworth 8, George Fox 1 - Box score
Whitworth's Case hit two more home runs and also threw a complete game as the starting pitcher. She allowed one run while scattering eight hits with five strikeouts and no walks to improve to 5-2.

Case hit a solo home run in the first and added two-run shot in the fourth for her fourth home run of the weekend and third of the day. She broke the old Whitworth career home run record of 11 held by Alana Klaus.

Lacey Parry hit a two-run home run to highlight Whitworth's three-run second inning. It was Parry's first home run of the season.

George Fox had a chance for a big inning in the third, but Case did not allow a run in spite of giving up four hits. After allowing a bloop single that fell in the middle of the infield, the Pirates got a fly out-throw out double play. The Bruins then got three straight singles to load the bases, but Case got Weatherman to hit into a fielder's choice to end the inning.

Down 8-0 in the top of the fifth inning, George Fox was one strike away from the game being over. But Tsuruda doubled to center with two outs and two strikes, and then scored on Morrison's single to prevent the game from ending on the eight-run rule.

The game might've ended early again in the bottom of the fifth and sixth innings, but George Fox pitcher Kayla Winkler stranded three Pirate runners in the fifth and Whitworth's Sarah Froman was thrown out at the plate from left field in the sixth.

Winkler went all the way as a starting pitcher for the Bruins, allowing eight runs on 14 hits with three strikeouts and five walks in six innings. Her record fell to 3-8.

Up Next: The Pirates, who remain a half game ahead of Linfield in the NWC standings, will play a four game series at Puget Sound on Friday and Saturday. Both doubleheaders will begin at Noon. The Loggers are 16-8 overall and 5-7 in the NWC after losing three of four games at home this weekend. UPS split a series with Willamette before losing both ends of a doubleheader against Pacific. The Pirates swept a four-game series from the Loggers last season in Spokane.