VILLANOVA, Pa.—Sophomore starter Caroline Pellicano (Norristown, Pa.) and freshman reliever Kelsey White (Taunton, Mass.) combined on a three-hit shutout as Villanova (14-17) won its fourth straight game, 7-0 over Saint Joseph's (9-15) at the Villanova Softball Complex on Wednesday afternoon. Graduate second baseman Paige Rauch (Windsor, N.Y.) tied a career-high with four runs scored and finished a double short of the cycle. Over the past six days the Wildcats have a four-game winning streak against St. John's and the Hawks in which Villanova has outscored the opposition by a 31-4 margin.
 
Pellicano (1-2, 0.93 ERA) started and pitched the first five innings while scattering three hits and striking out two batters without a walk. It was the third start and first win of the year for Pellicano, who has allowed just four earned runs (10 total) over 30.0 innings pitched spanning 11 appearances overall this season. White took over in the sixth inning and retired six of the final seven batters of the game with only a two-out fielding error accounting for a baserunner against her with two outs in the top of the sixth inning. She started the game in right field and drove in a run when she was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded in the bottom of the first inning.
 
The best thing the Wildcats could do at the beginning of the game was wait. Patience was a virtue as Saint Joseph's starting pitcher Emily Siler (5-7, 3.38 ERA) failed to record an out while issuing five walks and hitting a batter to the first six Villanova hitters of the game. She walked the bases loaded on free passes to junior third baseman Chloe Smith (Sacramento, Calif.), Rauch and senior shortstop Megan Kern (Royersford, Pa.) before plunking White to force in the first run of the game.
 
Two more walks – to junior offensive player Ally Jones (Brielle, N.J.) and senior catcher Ryan Henry (Ramsey, N.J.) – let two more runs in before Hawks reliever Amanda Herr entered with the bases loaded and nobody out. Herr retired the first two batters she faced but junior left fielder Dani Dabroski (Cedar Grove, N.J.) singled home Jones for the only hit of the inning which staked the Wildcats to a 4-0 lead in support of Pellicano.
 
Rauch led off the bottom of the second with a long home run to left-center field and later tripled to right field leading off in the bottom of the fourth inning. Her final at-bat of the game came in the sixth inning when she singled with one out, advanced to second on Kern's double off the left field fence and eventually scored the final run of the game on a passed ball.
 
Rauch was 3-for-3 with four runs scored, one RBI and a walk on the day. She was denied one more plate appearance to try for a double which would have given her the fourth cycle in Villanova history. Rauch herself has one of the previous three cycles, which she did on April 18, 2019 against Georgetown. She still did record only the eighth instance in school history of a player scoring four runs in a game and the first since current graduate second baseman Angela Giampolo (East Windsor, N.J.) scored four times against Eastern Illinois on February 22, 2019.
 
Villanova tied a season high with seven walks, each of which was issued to a different batter.
 
Coming up this weekend the Wildcats will travel to DePaul for a BIG EAST road series. The three-game set begins on Friday with first pitch scheduled for 3 p.m. Eastern (2 p.m. Central).