BRUNSWICK, Ga. - With two pitchers duels already under their belt, the College of Coastal Georgia softball team went to war with the 19th ranked St Thomas Bobcats, ultimately dropping game three of the series by a final of 11-8 on their home field. 

After just three runs were scored in two games a day ago, both the Bobcats (21-3, 6-0 SUN) and the Mariners (18-7, 3-3 SUN) brought the offense in game three combining for 19 runs on 22 hits, playing for two hours and 34 minutes in the series finale. 

St Thomas did the majority of their damage in the first three innings while CCGA controlled the final three innings of the game, leading to one of the longest played games by either side this season. 

Over the first three innings, STU outscored CCGA by a 9-3 margin and were threatening to invoke the five inning run rule at one point. The big inning for St Thomas was the second inning where they scored five runs on five hits in the inning.

Trailing 9-1 in the bottom of the third inning and desperately needing some offense, the Mariners got a pair of runs as five straight batters reached base in the inning, giving CCGA some momentum going into the later innings. 

With the pitching settling in for CCGA, their offense slowly but surely came alive. In the fifth, Kaitlyn Carolino drew a bases loaded walk to score another run, making the score 9-4 going into the sixth. 

CCGA was unable to keep the Bobcats off the board for too long as they answered with another run in the sixth, but in the bottom of the inning, the Mariners had their best offensive inning of the entire weekend. With Anna Toon out of the game due to the large lead, the Mariners got some help in the sixth as three straight walks loaded the bases to begin the inning, setting the stage for Rylie Smith. On the first pitch she saw, Smith hit her third home run of the season, but her first career grand slam as CCGA was right back in the game, now trailing 10-8.

The grand slam by Smith was the first home run by a Mariner in the new park's history. 

Mackenzie Southerland drew a walk right after the slam, but Toon returned to get the next three batters out to send the game to the seventh. 

St Thomas got a run in the seventh on a pinch hit home run from Isabella Andujar to give the Bobcats a much needed insurance run, leaving the Mariners three outs to score three runs to extend the game further. 

In the seventh, CCGA got a two out single from Rylee Mills, but it was not to be as St Thomas came into Brunswick and swept the Mariners. 

Mills finished 3-4 from the plate with a pair of RBI's while Smith went 1-3 while scoring a pair of runs and driving home four runs. 

The series loss to the Bobcats was the Mariners first Sun Conference series loss since they dropped two of three to Keiser last season in March, but it was the first time getting swept in a three game conference series since the Sun Conference moved to three game series in 2022. 

CCGA gets no reset weekend as they hit the road for another grueling conference series, this time going to Lakeland, Fla. to take on the 16th ranked Fire of Southeastern.