PHILADELPHIA – Second baseman Jackie Duenas (Riverside, Calif.), Felician University's only senior position player, went 5 for 9 with a home run and two stolen bases to lift the Golden Falcons to a pair of Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference softball victories over host Chestnut Hill College on Saturday afternoon on the CHC Softball Field. Felician captured the first game of the teams' scheduled doubleheader, 5-3 in eight innings, before emerging victorious in the nightcap, 4-2.

The games marked the end of the 2017 regular season for both teams. With the two wins, Felician (22-25, 13-13 CACC) moved past the Griffins in a jumbled CACC playoff race and captured one of the four spots in the conference tournament which were still up for grabs entering the weekend.

Under interim head coach Alexis Durando, the Golden Falcons reach the CACC playoffs for the third consecutive year. Their seeding and first-round opponent will be determined by the results of other league games on Sunday. Felician will begin play in the eight-team, double-elimination event at either 10 a.m. or noon on Thursday, May 4, on the campus of Georgian Court University in Lakewood, N.J.

Chestnut Hill (14-28, 12-14) erased an early 3-0 deficit in Game 1 on Saturday by reaching Felician reliever Erin Powers (Aberdeen, N.J.) (8-5) for three runs in the bottom of the fifth inning. With two runners on base and one out, Jessica Pulis (Baldwin, N.Y.) drove in a run with a groundout and Ariel Magee (North Cape May, N.J.) followed with an RBI single. A Felician fielding error with two outs allowed the Griffins to tie the score.

The 3-3 score held into extra frames, as both sides left two runners on base in the seventh. In the eighth, Felician loaded the bases with one out. Sophomore Brynne Bauman (Hazlet, N.J.) drove home the go-ahead run with a single, and an error on Bella Davis's (Chula Vista, Calif.) grounder gave the visitors an insurance run.

After issuing a leadoff walk in the home half of the eighth, Powers struck out the next two hitters. But a pair of singles loaded the bases, putting the winning run on base. Powers recorded another strikeout to end the game.

Jeannette Roldan (Hesperia, Calif.) was 4 for 5 and Duenas went 3 for 5 for Felician. Steph Donah (Clark, N.J.) hit a solo home run and Mia Montoya (Cypress, Calif.) had a two-run double as the Golden Falcons out-hit CHC, 14-6. Alex Sauer (New Milford, N.J.) went 2 for 3 for the Griffins.

After pitching four scoreless innings in a no-decision in Game 1, Felician junior right-hander Ashley Owens (Lockport, N.Y.) (13-15) went the distance in the circle in Game 2. Owens tossed 125 pitches in her complete-game effort in the nightcap, striking out five batters while walking none.

Duenas hit a solo homer in the first inning, but the Golden Falcons found themselves trailing, 2-1, after five. In the sixth, they loaded the bases with one out before Bauman raced home on a wild pitch to even the game. Duenas put Felician ahead for good with an RBI single. With runners on the corners, Duenas and Roldan executed a double-steal, with Roldan scoring on the back end, for a 4-2 lead.

Owens worked around a two-out error in the sixth, then pitched a perfect seventh to complete the Felician sweep. Montoya, Jaimie Parisi (Hackensack, N.J.) and Miranda Torres (Riverside, Calif.) picked up three hits apiece for the Golden Falcons, while Magee was 2 for 4 for Chestnut Hill.