Greer provides the power as UW softball sweeps Alabama

This is what sports fans expect during Memorial Day weekend — action-packed thrillers, gut-twisting cliffhangers and edge-of-your-seat drama.

And at the conclusion of the two-hour saga that played out at Husky Softball Stadium on Saturday, the Washington softball team and the majority of the 2,077 spectators got what they wanted — a happy ending.

Lauren Greer, who hit a go-ahead home run Friday, played the role of action hero again, driving home the winning runs with a seventh-inning single to lift the sixth-seeded Huskies to a 7-5 victory over 11th-seeded Alabama.

Combined with a 4-3 win over the Crimson Tide on Friday, Washington is headed to the Women's College World Series in Oklahoma City for the first time since 2004, the first such trip during coach Heather Tarr's three-year tenure.

The Huskies will open the World Series on Thursday against the winner of the Super Regional between 14th-seeded DePaul and No. 3 Oklahoma. DePaul leads the best-of-three series 1-0.

Saturday's win was a satisfying moment for Tarr, who is the third coach some Huskies have played for during a tumultuous period for the program that began with the firing of founding coach Teresa Wilson in late 2003.

"Our team deserves to be one of the top eight teams and we deserve a shot at the national championship," Tarr said after the Huskies completed a 2-0 sweep of Alabama, which was ranked No. 2 in the final regular-season coaches' poll. "I think we're that good."

Saturday's feel-good postgame celebration, which included Tarr's first career victory dousing by her players along the first-base line, was preceded by an afternoon of see-saw emotions and big momentum swings.

Alabama, playing as the home team, scored a run in the first inning and held a 1-0 lead until the fifth when the Huskies scored five times. Senior second baseman Dominique Lastrapes, who played in the 2004 World Series, delivered the key hit of the inning, a bases-loaded double that scored two runs.

The Crimson Tide, however, rallied from the 5-1 deficit with four runs in the bottom of the fifth.

Greer's winning single in the seventh came with two outs and Lastrapes (hit by a pitch) and Dena Tyson (single) on first and second. Center fielder Brittany Rogers' throw to the plate was high, leading to a strange sort of pas de deux between Lastrapes and catcher Ashley Holcombe, who was stretching for the overthrown ball. Lastrapes got her foot on the plate and Tyson slid home with an insurance run while Holcombe scrambled for the loose ball.

"I just had tunnel vision," Lastrapes said. "There is nothing that's going to stop me from scoring."

WASHINGTON 7, ALABAMA 5

Washington	000 050 2 — 7 6 0
Alabama	100 040 0 — 5 7 1

Lawrie and Matthews. Potter, Owens (5) and Holcombe. WP — Lawrie (29-11). LP — Owens (24-5). Sv — None. E — Rogers (3). LOB — Washington 6; UA 8. 2B — Moojen (5); Rogers (8); Woods (9); Morgan (8). SB — Praytor (35); Smith (3); Holcombe (4). Pitching stats — HBP: by Owens (Lawrie); by Lawrie (Eubanks); by Owens (Lastrapes). Pitches/strikes: Lawrie 145/92; Potter 73/39; Owens 56/32. T — 2:33. A — 2,077.