Box Score 1 | Box Score 2 LA MIRADA, Calif. --- The tension was palpable from start to finish during a six hour plus day of softball at Freedom Field on Saturday as the Eagles and Menlo Oaks split a pair of really, really good Golden State Athletic Conference games.
 
The Oaks earned a 5-4 win in the first game, holding off a Biola comeback attempt in the bottom of the seventh. The Eagles won 9-8 in game two, getting a Kayla Neff walk-off hit in the first extra inning and improving to 4-0 this season when scoring eight or more runs.
 
"[Getting that walk-off hit] felt so good," said the freshman catcher, Neff. "I have a Bible verse tattoo on my foot, Joshua 1:9, which says 'Don't be discouraged for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.' I always bring that to the plate with me and pray for a base hit every time. This time it worked!"
 
That Neff walk-off single off the fence in left field was definitely the highest emotional moment of the afternoon as the Eagles breathed a sigh of relief after allowing Menlo to tie game two in their final at-bats.
 
The walk-off single was only possible because of a fantastic performance in the top half of the inning by Kaile Chavez, who pitched 6.2 innings on the day and earned both a win and a loss.
 
In the international tiebreak rules each team begins its extra-innings at-bats with a runner automatically placed on second. Menlo advanced that runner to third on a sacrifice bunt before Chavez induced a fly ball into shallow left and a three-pitch strikeout to get out of the inning unscathed and setup Neff's heroics.
 
Chavez and Paula Damas made the biggest impact for the Eagles in the circle over the course of the full day of play. Damas threw an inning and two-thirds in relief late in the first game and held the Oaks at five runs to give Biola a chance to comeback in the seventh. She also pitched five and one-thirds innings in relief of Terri Van Dagens in game two and was effective in maintaining the Eagles' narrow lead up until giving up back-to-back doubles in the seventh inning.
 
Menlo won the opener by getting just enough production in the middle innings after both teams got on the board early. The Oaks scored two in the second and three more spread between the fifth and sixth innings to earn just enough of a margin to withstand Biola's two-out, two-run rally in the seventh.
 
The Eagles' comeback effort began with a perfectly placed Selina Sherlin single up the middle. She was pushed home when the next batter, Neff, doubled down the left field line. Neff had advanced to third as the Oaks attempted to catch Sherlin at the plate and scored as Paula Damas did well to hit a ground ball to second base for an RBI groundout. An Andi Hormel single was followed by a Maranda Galindo double and the Eagles had the game-tying run just one base away with two outs when the Oaks' reliever Jordan Kennedy got the final out to finish up her three-out save.
 
Neff was a shining star again today as she not only had the walk-off hit, but had five hits spread across the two games and drove in a pair of runs while scoring one herself.
 
Jay Perez was equally as impressive throughout the day. She was 1-for-1 in a pinch-hit opportunity in game one and was a perfect 4-for-4 in the second game win. That pair lead the team with a .389 batting average (Neff) and .371 (Perez). Not to mention the fact that they've combined to drive in or score 45 of the Eagles' 116 runs to this point in the season.
 
"The goal for today was to get out of the mental funk we've been in," said Head Coach Lorie Coleman. "We needed to bust out and get through that. We know physically we are good and that our mechanics are good but our confidence has been down. LaLa (Neff) helped us out with that today."
 
With the split Biola stays at .500 for the season in GSAC play (5-5). They are 16-9-2 overall with 18 games left in the regular season. The split pushed Menlo to 16-14 and 3-7 in conference.
 
Biola has a week off from play this next week and continues its schedule against San Diego Christian (11-12, 3-5 GSAC) on the road on March 21.