In a weekend where Mother Nature smiled on the ISU softball team for the first time in a home series, the Cyclones chalked up their first conference win of the season with a 3-0 victory against Texas Tech.

Senior Alyssa Ransom continued to be the driving force for the teams’ success, as she scattered just two hits, walked one and struck out five in a complete game shutout against the Red Raiders on Saturday.

Saturday also marked Ransom’s fifth consecutive start without allowing more than two earned runs, dating back to a 2-1 loss to Iowa on April 3rd.

“Today it was all about hitting spots,” Ransom said. “I’m throwing the same stuff I have been recently, but I had really good control on Saturday.”

The Cyclones were unable to complete the series sweep on Sunday afternoon, when they dropped the final game to the Red Raiders 5-0.

Despite being shutout in the second game, the Cyclones’ bats started to come alive against Texas Tech pitching, as the offense collected 14 hits in the series.

“I’m happy that we’re starting to get hits, but we’re still leaving too many runners on base,” said coach Stacy Gemeinhardt-Cesler.

“On Saturday we came up with two clutch hits, but [Sunday] we stranded three in the first and two in the second, and we just couldn’t get runs across.”

The Cyclones left a small village on the basepaths over the two weekend games, stranding nine runners on Saturday and eight on Sunday.

Seniors Fallon Johnson and Katie Reichling paced the Cyclone offense, each collecting two hits in both games on the weekend, and both scoring once Saturday.

Ashley Killeen drove in two of the three Iowa State runs Saturday – the 100th and 101st of her career – becoming the first player in ISU history to reach the century mark for runs batted in.

The Cyclones also played near-perfect defense to compliment their improving offense and consistent pitching, creating just one error on the weekend.

“We all knew we had to take care of business against Tech,” Ransom said.

“They’re a team we know we should beat, and we did everything we needed to in order to win on Saturday.”