COMMERCE, Texas – South Dakota softball team closed out a second straight 4-1 weekend with a 7-3 victory Sunday over Tarleton State in its final game at the Lion Invitational on Cain Family Field.
 
The Coyotes (8-7) equaled their season high for runs and hits (10) in a game and used a pair of two-run innings to snap a late 3-3 deadlock for the victory.
 
South Dakota plated three runs in the bottom of the first to take a quick 3-0 lead as Alecea Mendoza had a two-run single and Klara Cejkova-Kolaci recorded her first hit and first RBI in a Coyote uniform to drove home the third run of the inning.
 
Cejkova-Kolaci, a transfer from Hawai'i Hilo, wasn't done as she went 2-for-2 with a walk in the game and drove in another run in the bottom of the fifth. Her second RBI single of the game came after Delaney White had doubled home Alivia Conte to snap a 3-3 deadlock earlier in the frame.
 
Gabby Moser, who had six hits and drove in seven runs in the five games in Texas, put the exclamation point on the victory with a two-run blast over the centerfield fence. It was the ninth home run in Moser's career and first this season.
 
Madi Mangulis recorded her first collegiate pitching win and need just three pitches to do so. She relived starter Clara Edwards with two runners on and two-outs in the top of the fifth inning of a 3-3 deadlock and got the final out of the inning on a fly out.
 
Kori Wedeking worked the final two innings to record her first save of the season. Edwards allowed just one earned runs of the three Tarleton State scored while lowering her season ERA to 1.77.
 
The Coyotes entered the Lion Invitational with the Summit League's lowest ERA as a team staff and in five games in Texas allowed only three earned runs in 34 innings pitched.
 
South Dakota heads to Greenville, South Carolina to face off with Akron and host Furman in a four-game weekend beginning Friday, March 1.