No. 11 Washington (44-15) earned a 4-3 extra-innings win over No. 14 Nebraska (45-15) in the opening round of the WCWS. The Huskies will play No. 7 Tennessee on Friday at 4:00 p.m. PT. Nebraska will face No. 2 Florida in double-elimination on Saturday at 9:00 a.m. PT.
Washington's Kimberlee Souza (1-for-4) blasted a walk-off solo homer in the first-at bat in the bottom of the eighth to break the 3-all tie.
Nebraska took the first advantage, plating Gabby Banda (1-for-3) on Brooke Thomason's RBI fly out to left in the top of the first. Washington followed with two in the bottom on Kaitlin Inglesby's two-run homer to left center, scoring Victoria Hayward (1-for-1, 2 R).
Three innings later, Nebraska made it 2-all when Taylor Edwards (1-for-3) scored and soon followed with a 3-2 lead in the fifth when Tatum Edwards (0-for-4) reached home on a wild pitch. But Washington didn't let the Huskers get ahead of themselves as UW evened the score 3-3 in the seventh after Hayward tripled to right and scored her second run of the game on Hooch Fagaly's sac bunt.
Washington's Bryana Walker started the game, striking out two, walking one, allowing one hit, two runs and one earned in 3.0 innings of work. Kaitlin Inglesby (23-7) finished the game, earning the win after striking out two, walking one, allowing four hits and one earned run in 5.0 innings.
Starting for Nebraska, Tatum Edwards pitched 4.0 innings and struck out three, walked seven, allowed one hit, and both runs were earned. Emily Lockman closed, striking out four, walking one, getting two hits and both runs scored were earned.