UNIVERSITY CENTER, Mich. - The Saginaw Valley State University softball team finished-off a perfect 3-0 run to the NCAA Midwest Regional #2 Championship with a 3-1 victory over the University of Indianapolis Greyhounds today (5/15).

The game remained scoreless through the first 3 1/2 innings, as SVSU's Jade Fulton (Byron, Mich.) and Indy's Jennifer DeMotte held batters in check, allowing one base-runner combined through three full innings.

The Cardinals struck first in the bottom of the fourth inning.  After a pair of line-outs to give the Greyhounds two outs, Jill Peterson (Freeland, Mich.) was hit by a pitch to give the Cardinals a runner on first.  Peterson was lifted for pinch-runner Kimberly Sills (Clinton Twp., Mich./Chippewa Valley HS), who was advanced to second on a single by Natalie Wellman (Fairhaven, Mich./Anchor Bay HS).

With runners on first and second and two outs, senior first baseman Monica Gathright (Baroda, Mich./KVCC) stepped to the plate and drilled her first home run in a Cardinal uniform, a three-run shot run over the left field fence, giving SVSU the 3-0 advantage.

The score would remain 3-0 until the top of the sixth, when Indy's Jamie Keltz drove a deep home run to left center field, cutting the lead to 3-1.

That was one of only three hits Fulton would allow in the contest, as she settled down to close-out the Greyhounds in the sixth and set them down in order in the seventh, clinching the 3-1 victory.

Fulton struck-out 13 batters in the contest, with the last one being the final out of the game and the one that gave her sole possession of the single-season Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference strikeout record, giving her 371 on the year, breaking the previous record held by Ashland's Josie Nelson, who had 370 in the 2003 season.

Gathright, Wellman and Kalie Burdick (Milford, Mich.) each had one of SVSU's three hits, with Gathright providing all three RBI's.