PENSACOLA, Fla. – The pitching was dominant and the hitting was timely in the University of West Florida's 4-0 win over Lee on Sunday afternoon to close out the regular season. The win put West Florida at 30-12 overall and 22-7 in the Gulf South Conference, gave the Argonauts the weekend sweep over Lee, and helped UWF reach the 30-win mark for the fifth consecutive full season.
 
The Sunday victory kept UWF at the No. 4 spot in the Gulf South Conference ahead of the GSC Tournament that begins Thursday, May 6, at Choccolocco Park in Oxford, Alabama.
 
West Florida will match up with 5-seed West Georgia at 12:30 pm CT in the team's first of two games on Thursday, with the second game of the day coming at either 3:30 pm or 6 pm.
 
West Florida swept six GSC series during the year and won seven.
 
Freshman Montana Young got the start in the circle, striking out three batters over three scoreless innings while allowing just one hit. Grace Gilbert earned the win after entering in the fifth inning and improved her record to 8-6 on the year with two scoreless innings, and Kelsey Sweatt finished off the game with a perfect two innings, retiring all six batters she faced.
 
The UWF pitching trio spun a 1.67 ERA over the weekend and continued its stretch of impressive performances. Since April 2, the Argonauts are 12-2 with a 1.97 ERA, 92 strikeouts over 96.0 innings, and just a .201 opponent batting average.
 
West Florida threatened to score early in the game and broke through with a 4-spot in the fifth inning, and the rally started with a leadoff triple from Kayanna Perez. Teala Howard's single through the left side scored Perez to give UWF a 1-0 lead and stretch Howard's hitting streak to 13 games, and Ally Merrill singled up the middle to bring in Howard and Mika Garcia.
 
Just two batters later, Courtney McLellan lined a single over the Lee shortstop, scoring Merrill and capping off the scoring.
 
Sweatt entered the game in the top of the sixth and got three groundouts and three popouts over the next two innings to finish off the win.
 
West Florida will be making its 23rd appearance in the Gulf South Conference Tournament on Thursday. The Argonauts are 48-29 all-time in the tournament, with four tournament championships and seven appearances in the final.
 
UWF is also the reigning GSC Champion, having won the tournament in 2019 in Pensacola.