COCOA, Fla. – It was a split Saturday for the 17th-ranked University of West Florida softball team at the Florida Tech Invitational, as the Argonauts defeated Bentley 8-2 and fell to No. 8 Saint Anselm 1-0.
 
Pitching was the story for UWF, as Jeya Prasad and Kelsey Sweatt each went the distance in their starts. They combined for a 1.62 ERA and 14 strikeouts over 13.0 inings.
 
Brett Leiva hit a team-best .667 with two doubles in the doubleheader, Kelsey Hodges led the way with three hits, and Teala Howard stretched her hitting streak to six games to start the season while stealing two bases.
 
UWF will face Barry and Florida Tech on Sunday, at noon ET and 2:30 pm ET, at the Launch Pad Sports Complex in Cocoa.
 
GAME 1: No. 17 UWF 8, Bentley 2
West Florida and Bentley traded the lead in the second and third innings of Game 1, but UWF would pull away in the bottom of the third.
 
Erin Moon scored UWF's first run when Mallory Vining reached on an error in the second inning. After three consecutive Bentley hits turned into two runs for the Falcons in the top of the third, UWF bounced back with three runs in the bottom half.
 
Madelyn Vasquez reached on an error from Bentley's center fielder and she, and Teala Howard, came across to score and give UWF the lead again. Kelsey Hodges added the first of her three RBIs with a single just a few batters later, scoring Brett Leiva.
 
Jeya Prasad earned her first career win with a strong performance. The redshirt freshman struck out nine batters over 7.0 innings, with just one walk issued.
 
Prasad became more dominant as the game went on – she did not allow a hit after Bentley scored its two runs in the third innings, and she retired 13 of the final 14 batters she faced. Prasad has struck out 20 batters in 16.2 innings this year, against just three walks.
 
West Florida added four more insurance runs in the fifth, from Hodges, Moon, and Kayla Mayo. Hodges reached on an error to score Vasquez and Leiva, Moon doubled to bring in Hodges, and Mayo reached on an error that drove in Moon.
 
Saturday marked Moon's first multi-hit game, and the first game with multiple RBIs for Vasquez and Hodges.
 
GAME 2: No. 17 UWF 0, No. 8 Saint Anselm 1
The game with Saint Anselm was a classic pitcher's duel, between Kelsey Sweatt and SAC's Halie Hicks.
 
Sweatt and Hicks traded zeroes from the third inning through the end of the game, with Saint Anselm picking up the lone run of the game in the second with a two-out single.
 
The Argonauts struggled to get anything going offensively, though Vasquez added a double in the fourth and Howard doubled in the sixth.
 
The Hawks did not do much more against Sweatt on Saturday. The senior struck out five batters and allowed just five hits that were scattered six innings of work. Sweatt escaped a jam in the third inning when a grounder to Howard at third base turned into an inning-ending 5-3 double play.
 
After that, Sweatt sat down 9 of the next 10 batters she faced.