BENTONVILLE, Ark. – The No. 2-seed Southern Arkansas softball team suffered its first loss of the 2016 Great American Conference Softball Championship Tournament on Saturday afternoon as No. 4-seed Harding University upeneded SAU by a final score of 5-4.
 
With the loss, the No.18 nationally-ranked Lady Muleriders (43-9) will have to turn around later on Saturday night and play in an elimination game against the winner of Arkansas Tech and Henderson State, which is currently being played.
 
*Follow SAU's game later this evening through the following links:
            LIVE STATS: http://stats.statbroadcast.com/broadcast/?id=131193
            LIVE VIDEO: http://gacsportsnetwork.com/
 
In the game against Harding, the Lady Muleriders fell behind 2-0 through the first three and a half innings as the Lady Bisons (37-22) scored single runs in the third and fourth innings. In the bottom of the fourth, however, the Lady Muleriders found the run and hit columns as Maddie Dow belted a no-doubt solo homerun to straightaway centerfield.
 
Harding score an unearned run in the top of the fifth to make it a 3-1 game, but SAU rallied for a pair of runs in the bottom of the frame to tie the game at three-all as Liz Hudgins had a RBI double and then Taylor Guin registered a RBI on a sacrifice fly out to centerfield.
 
In the top of the sixth, Harding plated a pair of runs on three hits and one error by SAU as the Lady Bisons took a 5-3 lead in the game.
 
The Lady Muleriders were turned away in order in the bottom of the sixth, but in the bottom of the seventh SAU pulled to within a run, 5-4, as Hudgins drove in her second run of the game with a two-out single to left-centerfield, scoring pinch-runner Taylor Stricklin.
 
The game ended in the next at-bat, however, as Harding completed the upset to advance to Championship Sunday.