Box Score

Henderson State's bid for a Great American Conference Softball Tournament Championship fell short as the Lady Reddies lost 6-2 to Southeastern Oklahoma in the championship game, Sunday in Bentonville, Ark.

Henderson State, 23-32 on the season, defeated East Central 2-0 earlier in the day to advance to its first conference tournament championship appearance in school history.

The Savage Storm, ranked third nationally, scored their first run of the game in the first-inning without a hit.

Jessica Simmons led off the inning reaching on a walk and advancing to second with a stolen base. After Simmons advanced to third on a ground out, Courtney Riddle hit a long fly ball to right field to score Simmons and give SEOSU a 1-0 lead.

The Lady Reddies loaded the bases in the third-inning as Amy Halter and Sarah Gipson had back-to-back one-out singles followed by a walk given up to Katey Gorsage.

With two outs, Hali Kizer blasted a double off the left-center field fence to plate two runs and give HSU a 2-1 lead.

Southeastern, 44-7 on the year, responded with a run in the bottom half of the inning as Courtney Moore hit a two-out single to right-field to score Lacie Cook who walked and stole second earlier in the inning.

With the score tied at 2-2 in the bottom of the fourth, Darrian Williams began the inning for Southeastern with a double down the leftfield line to end the day for HSU pitcher Kasey Carlock.

After the HSU pitching change, Lauren Renneker advanced Williams to third on a sacrifice bunt followed by a RBI sacrifice bunt by Paige Priest to give the Savage Storm a 3-2 lead.   

Southeastern added to its lead in the fifth-inning as the Savage Storm put together a pair of hits and took advantage of a Henderson error to make the score 4-2.

Southeastern had a chance to have a big inning as the Savage Storm had runners on second and third with no outs. HSU pitcher Cagen Medlock, however, got Whitney Hamilton to fly out to centerfield and Williams to pop-up into a double-play to end the inning.

SEOSU added some insurance runs in the sixth-inning scoring a pair of runs on four hits in the inning to increase the lead to 6-2.

The Lady Reddies were held in check the final four innings by Southeastern pitchers Jacee Bennett and Mindy McElroy.

Halter and Katie Hulan had two hits each for the Lady Reddies with Kizer having a double and two runs batted in.

Three Lady Reddies were selected to the GAC All-Tournament team including Morgan South, Sarah Gipson and Amber Wilburn.

South ended the tournament going 6-for-15 with two runs scored and a pair of RBI while turning in some stellar plays defensively.

Gipson went 6-for-17 with a double, a home run and four RBI to go along with four runs scored.

Wilburn went 4-for-15 which included a game-winning home run in the first game over East Central and a 3-for-3 performance in the second game against the Lady Tigers.