AUSL Notebook, July 5-11: Bandits Set Win-Streak Record, Talons Clinch, Canady Gets First Win

The Chicago Bandits set an AUSL record with their ninth straight win Saturday. On the same night, the Utah Talons became the first team to clinch a 2026 postseason berth. NiJaree Canady got her first professional win, and it was a shutout. This notebook covers Sunday, July 5, through Saturday, July 11.

Bandits win nine straight

Chicago won all four of its games this week. Kat Sandercock threw a complete game in a 2-1 win over Texas on Sunday. On Monday, Lexi Kilfoyl threw 4.1 scoreless innings of relief in a 7-5 win.

The Bandits then went to Hillsboro and beat the Portland Cascade 8-6 on Friday. They scored five runs in the first inning, including two-run home runs from Morgan Zerkle and Taryn Kern. It was Kern’s first professional home run. She finished 3-for-4 with a triple and three RBIs.

“You stay ready and you make moments into memories,” head coach Shonda Stanton said of Kern. “And it’s gonna be a great memory.”

Sandercock shut out Portland 2-0 on Saturday on three hits, with six strikeouts. The AUSL said the win gave Chicago the league record for consecutive wins, at nine. Ailana Agbayani and Zerkle drove in the runs.

The league also said the Bandits led the AUSL in hits, runs, doubles and triples, with a team batting average of .318. Chicago started the season 0-4.

Talons clinch first

Utah trailed Oklahoma City 3-2 going to the seventh inning Saturday at Tom Heath Field. Jadelyn Allchin homered to tie it. With two outs, Sharlize Palacios hit a two-run home run for a 5-3 lead. Megan Faraimo finished a complete game with 10 strikeouts in the 5-4 win.

That clinched a postseason berth. The Talons lead Chicago by one game for the No. 1 seed, which comes with a bye to the Championship Series.

The Spark won the first game of that series Thursday. Sydney Sherrill hit a walk-off double in the bottom of the seventh for a 4-3 win after Sydney Romero‘s two-run homer had tied the game in the fifth.

Canady’s first win

NiJaree Canady threw eight scoreless innings Friday at Dell Diamond as Texas beat Carolina 1-0. It was her first professional win. The AUSL said it was the first shutout in Volts history and the team’s first complete game of the season.

Canady allowed five hits and struck out six on 131 pitches. The Blaze loaded the bases with one out in the sixth, and she got a foul out and a strikeout to escape. Texas scored in the bottom of the eighth on a sacrifice fly by Rylie Boone. The win ended an eight-game losing streak.

The Volts walked off again Saturday, 4-3. Rachel Garcia tied the game with a two-run double in the sixth, and Jackie Lis singled home the winning run in the seventh. Reese Atwood had hit a three-run homer for Carolina in the second.

Cascade win three straight, then lose two

Carley Hoover threw a complete game Sunday in an 8-4 win in Oklahoma City. Kendra Falby hit a bases-clearing triple during a seven-run third inning.

Portland then began its final homestand, nine straight games at Hillsboro Ballpark. Kenzie Brown struck out nine in a complete-game 4-2 win over Carolina on Tuesday, beating Karlyn Pickens.

On Wednesday, Hoover threw all eight innings of a 2-1 win and struck out 11, a career high. The Cascade won it in the eighth when Tori Vidales’ ground ball led to an Ana Gold throwing error that let Sierra Sacco-Ferrie score.

Chicago’s two wins in Hillsboro later in the week dropped Portland to 11-9.

Paige Sinicki’s return

Paige Sinicki played her first game for the Cascade on Tuesday, eight months after she was diagnosed with Stage 2 breast cancer.

Sinicki received the diagnosis on Nov. 11, 2025, while working as a graduate assistant with the Utah softball program. She was 22. She had surgery and eight rounds of chemotherapy, then began radiation in June at the Huntsman Cancer Institute in Utah. She kept training through it and joined team meetings by Zoom in the fall.

She was cleared to practice in July, and the league reinstated her from its temporary inactive list on Tuesday. Portland planned to use her as a pinch runner. When Sis Bates was hit on the forearm by a pitch, Sinicki went in at second base in the fifth inning. She fielded a ground ball for the second out that inning. In her first trip to the plate, she battled Karlyn Pickens for eight pitches before grounding out. The home crowd at Hillsboro Ballpark cheered her through it.

“What a blessing it is to take each day, each hour, each second, and each moment one at a time,” Sinicki wrote on Instagram during her treatment.

At Oregon from 2022 to 2025, Sinicki was the 2024 Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year and the first player in program history to win an NFCA Rawlings Gold Glove. She made her first start of the season the next night.

Standings through July 11

Sunday’s schedule has the Bandits at the Cascade and the Talons at the Spark. Full dates are on our 2026 AUSL schedule.