Softball Opens ASC Tournament with Win
May 1, 2008

IRVING, Texas – The 9th-ranked University of Texas at Tyler (36-7) softball team made quite an impact in its American Southwest Conference tournament debut, as it shutout Howard Payne (25-16), 7-0.

The game would remain scoreless until the bottom of third inning, when junior Kate Bell (Forney, Texas) hit a grand slam homerun to give the Patriots a 4-0 lead.

In the fourth, UT Tyler would add another run off of a triple by senior Lindsey Peters (Shreveport, La.) to go up 5-0.

In the sixth inning, Peters would score freshman Brittanni Hanna (Mesquite, Texas) for the second time on the day, this time via a double to left field. Peters herself would score later in the inning on a sacrifice fly from junior ‘Roo Richardson (Platteville, Colo.) to cap off the scoring.

Sophomore Kara Turner (Troup, Texas) went 0-for-1 on the plate at the day, but drew a UT Tyler single-game record of three walks. Turner is only the fifth Patriot in program history to accomplish the feet.

UT Tyler produced 11 hits in the game, marking just the second time in the last seven games that the Patriots have had 10 or more hits in an outing. During the regular season, UT Tyler had 10 plus hits in 21 of its 40 regular season game.

Also having a good day at the plate were Brittanni Hanna, freshman Sara DeStefano (Franklin, Texas) and sophomore Amanda Busby (Elysian Fields, Texas) who each had two hits in the game.

Freshman Kelsey Harrington (Texarkana, Texas) picked up win number 15 on the year, as she allowed just four hits over 6.1 innings in the combined shutout. Freshman Stacy Shepherd (Houston, Texas) came into close out the game and retired the final two batters.

The Patriots will now advance in the double-elimination tournament to play West Division champions, Mary Hardin-Baylor tomorrow at 11 a.m., with potential games to follow at 2 and 5 p.m.

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