SACRAMENTO, Calif. – Senior second baseman Isabella Barge launched a two-run home run while Alexis McFarland and Jocelyn Villaflor each finished with two hits and a double, leading St. Francis to an 8-3 win over Pioneer in a non-league girls' prep fastpitch matchup at Schuster Field Tuesday.

The Troubadours improve to 3-5 for the year. The Patriots suffer their first loss of the year to slip to 5-1 overall.

Barge's jumped on the first pitch to barrel a Belle Cuevas pitch deep to left, bringing in McFarland, whose two-run double two pitches earlier had given St. Francis a 4-2 lead. McFarland, Barge, VIllaflor and Marissa Jensen each drove in two. Shortstop Ariella Alcantar represented a fourth Troubie with two hits in the contest.

Overall, St. Francis fell into an immediate 2-0 hole in the top of the first, got those two runs back in the third, added four more off the bats of McFarland and Barge in the fourth, then tacked on two more insurance runs in the sixth to craft the victory.

Pioneer shortstop and Stanford commit Marisa Bryson delivered an RBI single in the first, then later scored on a ground out to get the Patriots started. Pitcher Kaili Heeb curbed the rally by snaring a hard comebacker off the bat of senior Sophia O'Quelly. She went on to scatter eight hits across her seven complete innings in the circle en route to the win.

The Troubies erased the deficit in the third. McFarland led off the frame with a line to center, then Lillyana Perkins attempted to move her senior teammate into scoring position with a sacrifice bunt. The speedy Perkins ended up beating out the throw for a hit, then SF loaded the bases when Barge reached on an error. Villaflor and Jensen followed with back-to-back sacrifice flies.

Heeb worked her way out of a bases-loaded jam in the top of the fourth, drawing an infield fly pop-up and a force out to Barge to keep the Patriots stranded. This led to the four-run bottom half of that inning. Heeb helped her cause with a leadoff single, Hazel Pryor drew four straight balls for a walk, then Elizabeth Bettar sacrificed her teammates 60 feet into scoring position to set up the McFarland double to the opposite-field gap.

Bryson got one run back for Pioneer in the fifth with a monster blast to left, but Heeb got UNLV commit Caitlin Mayfield to pop softly to Alcantar at short then fanned first baseman Selena Martinez Palacios to maintain a 6-3 Troubie edge.

Villaflor knocked a double to left to score Barge, then came in to score when Jensen lined a hard grounder off Cuevas' foot for a hit, extended the SF lead to five at 8-3. Heeb pitched a scoreless seventh, despite a Bryson double to center.

Pioneer had won its five previous games by a combined 52-17 margin, including 15-5 against Cardinal Newman and a 16-0 shutout against crosstown rival Woodland. Tuesday's game marked the Pats' lowest scoring output and most runs allowed in the young 2026 season.

Barge's homer represents the second by a Troubie this year and the first of her career. She is now hitting .286/.355/.607 in eight games this year. Alcantar's 2-for-4 performance raises her OPS to a team-leading 1.087, while McFarland and Jensen each have team highs of seven RBIs.

St. Francis returns to Sierra Foothill League play in road games at Folsom (Wednesday) and Granite Bay (Friday) this week. Both contests start at 4 p.m.