Box Score

FAYETTEVILLE, Arkansas – Kelee Grimes fired her second career no-hitter with nine strikeouts Sunday morning for the Northwestern State softball team in a 8-0, six inning victory over Tennessee State in the third-place game of the Arkansas Fastpitch Invitational at Bogle Park.

 

Grimes (2-4) was one out away from a perfect game for NSU (3-12) when she nicked Savannah Gutierrez with a pitch, allowing her a free base. Grimes then got TSU's (4-5) Tedra Alford to fly out to rightfield to complete the 12th no-hitter in program history.

 

“Kelee was working ahead in the count today, and that really allowed her to throw a lot of different pitches and keep hitters off-balance. She was going right after hitters all day long and just trusted her stuff,” said head coach Donald Pickett.

 

Grimes threw her first solo no-hitter last season on April 6, 2011 in a 2-0 win over Alcorn State. The Pineville native was also part of a no-no on March 9, 2010 when she combined with Brooke Boening and former Lady Demon Jessica English in a no-hit win over Grambling.

 

“We have all the confidence in the world in Kelee and we know she's going to have a lot more performances like this one before the season is over,” Pickett said.

 

Blair Beard registered her second consecutive multi-hit game and her fourth on the year with singles in the fourth and sixth frames. NSU as a team outhit TSU 8-0.

 

“Blair had a really good weekend for us. I'm not surprised at all about her performances over the last few games - this is what we expect out of Blair. She's a very talented player and she's consistently getting on base for us,” Pickett said.

 

The Lady Demons broke the game open in the fourth inning with a monster, seven-run frame. Cali Burke and Beard each registered two-RBI singles to do the heavy damage. Kylie Roos and Cheyenne DeLaGarza also tallied RBI singles in an inning that featured 11 NSU batters at the plate.

 

NSU added on in the fifth when Sam Roberts knocked a RBI single to rightfield with two outs and runners on first and second. Tara McKenney scored on the play.

 

“We came to play today and we're going to build off this win,” Pickett said. “We knew we hadn't been playing our best ball so far this season, but today we came out, relaxed and played with confidence.”

 

Shea Morris (3-2) took the loss for the Tigers, allowing four earned runs on two hits and two walks in three innings. TSU committed four errors in the field.

 

“This is the team we expected to have at the beginning of the season,” Pickett said. “We were consistent all the way through the lineup and just kept battling at the plate with an aggressive approach.”

 

The Lady Demons will look to duplicate this performance on Wednesday when they travel to Houston Baptist for a doubleheader starting at 2.