The University of Illinois Springfield softball team swept a GLVC doubleheader from Southern Indiana for the first time in program history on Sunday afternoon in Chatham, Ill. The Prairie Stars won by scores of 8-7 and 10-2.
 
UIS took a 6-4 lead in the fifth inning of the first game after plating four runs in the inning. Jillian Mathis had the big hit with a bases loaded single that scored three runs in a play that also included a Screaming Eagles error.
 
Southern Indiana came right back and took a 7-6 advantage in the sixth. UIS tied the back-and-forth game in the bottom of the sixth on a RBI single by Carolyn Franke. Both teams stranded scoring chances in the seventh to force extra innings.
 
In the top of the eighth, Southern Indiana got a two-out single. UIS brought in Payton Long from the bullpen and she stranded the runner with a strikeout. In the bottom of the inning, Ashley Klinzing started a rally with a one-out single. A groundout advanced her to second and brought Mathis to the plate. Mathis hit a grounder to short and beat the throw to first. Klinzing didn't stop at third on the hit and scored the game-winner before Southern Indiana could make a throw to the plate.
 
Matthis finished with two hits, three RBI and a run despite not entering the game until the fifth inning. Klinzing had four hits and three runs. Lindsay LaDere, Calla Wickenhauser, and Carly Chovanec all had two hits apiece.
 
In game two, UIS broke a 1-1 tie with seven runs in the third inning. Danielle Dennis had a bases clearing three-run double in that inning, and Franke and Natalie Cokel each had two-run singles. UIS added single runs in the fourth and fifth, and won by the eight-run rule.
 
Dennis earned the win on the mound after throwing three innings and giving up just one run and three hits. She also had four RBI, two hits, and a run. Cokel had two hits, two runs and two RBI, and Wickenhauser had two hits, two runs and one RBI.
 
UIS moves to .500 in GLVC play at 4-4, and is now 9-15 on the season. The Prairie Stars hit the road next week with a doubleheader on Saturday at Indianapolis.