GOLDEN, Colo. - Colorado School of Mines walked off with a win for the second straight day - this time thanks to a Stefanie Brunello home run - as they split their series with Colorado Christian on Sunday.

Mines took the morning game 4-3 on Brunello's solo shot, but CCU prevailed 12-8 in a slugfest to end the series. The Orediggers are now 19-13 overall and 18-10 in RMAC play; the Cougars, who entered the series having won 14 straight games, are 16-6 and 15-3 in-conference.

Clara Larson broke the Mines career record for doubles with the 65th of her career, snapping Sarah Van Lingen's mark of 64 to add to her collection of Oredigger marks that already included career home runs and RBI. 

Renata Boyd led Mines at the plate in the series going 8-for-13 (.615) while Brunello hit .455 and slugged 1.000 and Kayleigh Krueger had a team-high six RBI.

GAME 1 - MINES 4, COLORADO CHRISTIAN 3
Stefanie Brunello's lead-off home run in the bottom of the seventh broke the tie and gave Mines its second walk-off win in as many days with a 4-3 score.

Brunello's bomb capped a fantastic back-and-forth game that saw the Orediggers rally from 3-1 down to tie it, while pitching and defense bailed them out of multiple jams as the Cougars stranded 10 runners and seven in scoring position.

Sadriena Rodriguez (4-0) won for the second time in the series, relieving Sydney Marchando in a 3-3 game to start the seventh and striking out two in the inning; Marchando allowed three runs through six. CCU starter Jennifer Romero went four innings and allowed three, with Samaria Roope (3-2) taking the loss allowing the winning run.

Mines took a 1-0 lead in the first thanks to Kailey Robb's bases-loaded single to score Brunello, but CCU plated all three of their runs in the third inning with RBI from Kenzie Middleton, Piper Lujan, and Stephanie Day to lead 3-1.

Marchando worked out of bases-loaded situations unscathed in the fourth and fifth, and that set Mines for a big bottom of the fifth. Renata Boyd led off with a single and scored on Larson's record-break double, and Kayleigh Krueger's groundout let Larson score later in the inning to tie it. 

CCU again stranded a runner on third in the sixth and left Kayla Middleton on third in the seventh after a one-out triple; that left it 3-3 heading into the last of the seventh, when Brunello grooved a 2-0 pitch to left-center, her third round trip of the season, to win the game.

GAME 2 - COLORADO CHRISTIAN 12, MINES 8
Both teams' bats figured out the pitching in the series finale as CCU outlasted Mines 12-8.

The two sides combined for 28 hits and used six pitchers in the contest. Kylie Redding led Mines going 3-for-4 while Sidney Wilson hit a three-run home run; Stephanie Day paced CCU with a 3-for-5, 4-RBI game and Samaria Roope drove in three. 

Wilson's three-run homer in the second gave Mines an early lead, but CCU responded with a four-run third to go ahead 4-3. In the bottom of the third, Krueger doubled in pinch-runner Sara Larson before Megan Dickson laid down a squeeze bunt and Brunello tripled to lead 7-4. The game came unraveled in a six-run CCU fourth, however, as they went up 10-7, and after Redding scored on an error in the bottom half of that inning, solo homers by Day in the fifth and Piper Lujan in the seventh made it a 12-8 final score.

Sydney Rawlings (1-1) earned the win with six strikeouts in five innings of relief for starter Julie Katz. Mines used four pitchers with starter Lauren Decker departing in the third; Kylie Redding (4-5) had the loss in two innings of work while Sadriena Rodriguez and Sydney Marchando also appeared.

NEXT UP
Mines heads across town to visit Regis next weekend.