AAC Tournament Final: Bulls Come up Short Against Three Time Champion Tulsa

USF Softball’s exciting quest for the AAC Tournament Championship came up short as the Bulls lost to 6-seed Tulsa 4-1 Saturday as the Golden Hurricanes became back-to-back-to-back champs in their own backyard.

Tulsa, the preseason favorite, didn’t come into the tournament playing like a 6-seed. Junior starting pitcher Emily Watson (23-11) completed the trifecta pitching all 21 innings in Tulsa’s three tournament victories giving up only one earned run. Watson pitched another gem on Sunday scattering only three hits and giving up an unearned run to the top-seeded Bulls. Her performance landed her a well-deserved tournament Most Outstanding Player honors.

Freshman ace Georgina Corrick (15-8) started for the Bulls but ran into trouble early in the first. With the bases loaded and two out, a single drove in a run, but Tulsa’s aggressive baserunning robbed them of another when a play at the plate got Corrick out of the inning.

The Golden Hurricane added to their lead in the top of the third where four straight hits plating two ended the outing for Corrick. Senior JoJo McGill stepped into the circle stopping any further damage from the Tulsa offense.

The Bulls finally scratched a run across in the home half of the fourth when an Astin Donovan hit to left field was stretched to a triple when it went through the five hole of the left fielder. Lindsey Devitt drove Donovan home with a sacrifice fly scoring USF’s only run.

Tulsa added another run in the top half of the fifth and Emily Watson only gave up one more hit en route to hoisting the championship.

The Bulls landed three on the All-Conference team in junior Lindsey Devitt, senior Lauren Evans and junior Macy Cook. Evans hit the GW RBI single to beat UConn and was perfect at the dish against Memphis. Devitt had a productive weekend with six hits and two RBI en route to her 18th multi-hit game of the seasonn and Cook mashed a three-run HR in the comeback against Memphis and had a total of four RBI.

USF will await its fate in the NCAA Tournament during the NCAA Selection Show on Sunday at 10 p.m. Since Tulsa holds the auto-bid for winning the tournament the Bulls will hope for an at-large bid with their resume including a regular season championship and an RPI of 42. The Selection Show will be live on ESPN 2. And hopefully won’t have any technical difficulties like the feed today.