NATCHITOCHES – Northwestern State fell short of a second straight senior day finale win in as many seasons on Saturday thanks to a career pitching performance from Texas A&M-Corpus Christi.
 
After scoring 13 runs on 19 hits across two games on Friday, the Demons (7-43, 4-23) were held hitless through five innings, getting just two baserunners during that time, by junior pitcher Malia Williams. A leadoff single from Camryn Becnel in the sixth broke up the no-hitter and led to NSU's only run in a 6-1 loss to the Islanders (12-36, 6-21).
 
The loss brings an end to the season and the first under head coach Jenny Fuller.
 
"I'm proud of our team," Fuller said. "They didn't ask to be the youngest team in the country, and they fought the whole way through and learned a lot. A lot of things that we can take into next season. They just need to continue to work hard and make sure that we learn from these losses. I think next year we can take a big leap in the right direction."
 
For the third time in the series the Islanders took the lead in the top of the first. A leadoff single, sacrifice bunt and wild pitch put the go-ahead run at third with one out. An RBI fielder's choice made it a 1-0 game before a strikeout ended the inning.
 
Corpus scored runs in four of the first five innings, only being held off the scoreboard in the second. A two-out walk followed by a double and single added two in the third, a wild pitch and sacrifice fly brought in two more in the fourth and a fifth-inning squeeze bunt plated a run in the sixth.
 
The six runs scored were more than enough support for the Islander's Williams who faced just two over the minimum through the first five innings of the game.
 
After allowing four runs, two of them earned, on four hits in 2 2/3 innings of game one of the series on Friday, Williams retired 15 of the first 17 batters she faced in the finale. Ary Garcia Santana was the only batter to reach base through five innings for the Demons, drawing a walk in the third and reaching on an error in the fifth.
 
Becnel finale broke through on a single to center to open the bottom of the sixth, which was followed by a five-pitch walk to Aly Delafield and base hit from senior Bailie Ragsdale.
 
Ragsdale's fifth hit of the weekend, and 144^th of her career, led to the Demons' lone run of the game after the throw in from left caromed into the NSU dugout advancing all three runners one base, scoring Becnel from third on the error.
 
The Demons failed to add any more in the inning on a ground ball to third and back-to-back swing-and-miss strikeouts to end the frame and the only scoring threat of the game.
 
The two hits are the fewest allowed by Williams in a game this year and the one run is the second fewest of the season behind her shutout of HCU earlier this year.
 
Ragsdale finished her NSU career having started 170 games over four seasons with a .282 batting average, 144 hits, 79 runs scored and 25 stolen bases.