Georgia Comes Back to Walk Off Aggies in Eight Innings, 8-7

Saturday, March 26

Athens, Ga.

6:00 p.m.

University of Georgia

29-4, 4-1

Texas A&M

18-12, 1-7

Texas A&M

Georgia

Georgia Comes Back to Walk Off Aggies in Eight Innings, 8-7

March 26, 2022 | Softball

Box Score

ATHENS, Ga. – The 17^th-ranked Georgia Bulldogs battled back from down 7-1 to beat the Texas A&M Aggies, 8-7, in eight innings Saturday night at Jack Turner Stadium. Redshirt-junior Jaiden Fields provided the walk-off hit in the eighth to clinch the series win.

Georgia climbs to 29-4 on the season and 4-1 in SEC play. This is Georgia's second SEC series win of the season.

The offense strung together 11 hits in the game led by a three-hit game from junior Sydney Kuma. Sophomore Jayda Kearney had two hits in the contest. Both drove in two runs.

Senior Lauren Mathis (3-1) pitched the final four innings of the game, allowing no hit and no runs en route to the victory. Mathis fanned four Aggies in her outing.

Sophomore Britton Rogers worked one and a third innings in her start in the circle, allowing five runs. Freshman Kylie Macy worked two and two-third out of the pen, allowing two runs.

The Aggies (18-12, 1-7) strung together five runs in the top of the second inning. Georgia went to the pen for Macy. Texas A&M loaded the bases again, but Macy was able to work out of the jam in the frame. TAMU widened the lead in the third with an unearned run, 6-0.

Aniyah Black led off the bottom of the third inning with her third home run of the season to put the Bulldogs on the board, 6-1.

The Aggies got the run back in the top of the fourth, 7-1. Georgia then began its comeback heading to the bottom of the fourth.

Following a long leadoff single off the wall in right from Kearney in the bottom of the inning, Kuma blasted her seventh homer of the season to cut the Aggie lead to 7-3. Georgia proceeded to load the bases after the home run. A wild pitch and a sacrifice fly pushed two more Georgia runs across, slicing the lead to 7-5 going to the fifth inning.

With one swing of the bat, Kearney tied the game at 7-all with a two-run home run in the fifth. The home run moved Kearney into a tie for the team lead with nine on the season.

Mathis pitched a gem out of the pen, continually giving the Bulldog offense the opportunity to win.

Pinch hitter Ellie Armistead reached on a one-out single sent back up the middle in the eighth. She took second on a wild pitch then moved to third when Savana Sikes reached on an error by the Aggie shortstop. Fields then lined a single over the first baseman to drive in Armistead and complete the comeback victory, 8-7.

The series finale is set for Sunday afternoon at 2 p.m. at Jack Turner Stadium. The matchup will stream live on SEC Network+.

Head Coach Tony Baldwin
Opening Statement...
"Obviously, there were some things that we need to clean up and do a little bit better, but the thing that we just keep stressing to our team is that this isn't a beauty contest, and it isn't a perfect contest. It's a competition, and we had to go fight as hard as we could with what we had today. Was it our best? I don't know what the best is, but I know that we fought together. I thought it was a great team win. I thought there were a lot of different individuals that stepped up and allowed us to get some momentum. I thought Aniyah Black's homerun was huge, kind of got the ball rolling. I thought Lauren Mathis threw the ball outstanding there at the end. Jaiden [Fields] is just a big game player. The bigger the moment, the more her talent shines. We've talked about that with her, and I'm just super proud of her ability to calm things down and do what she does best right there at the end."

On Lauren Mathis…
"I'm super proud of the way that she's worked hard. I thought she really attacked with her pitches today. That gave her an opportunity to move the ball around the zone, keep their hitters off balance. I thought she worked from a really good position. Like I said, I thought she attacked really well, and I couldn't be prouder of her. I thought she really gave us an opportunity to come back and win that game."

Redshirt-junior Jaiden Fields
On the final at-bat….
"Nothing crazy was going through my mind. I was just trying to keep it calm and just do what I know how to do. If I didn't do it somebody else would come in behind me and do it. My teammates were there for me, so I was just trying to lock in with them and just stay calm up there."

On coach's message after the game…
"That he's proud of us. He's glad that we got the series win but tomorrow counts just another point as any other day so just trying to go for the sweep. Not be okay with this but just to go for the sweep in general."