TAMPA, Fla. – The Wichita State softball team fell, 3-1, in the opening round of the American Athletic Conference Softball Championship to the No. 6 seed, Tulsa, on Thursday morning.

In just the second pitch of the game, Tulsa outfielder Julia Hollingsworth crushed a solo home run over the right field fence for a 1-0 lead with Wichita State pitcher Bailey Lange knocking down the next three batters in order to close out the top of the inning.

The Shocker bats went quiet through the first two innings. Lange and the defense got their first three-up, three-down in the third with Paige Luellen drawing the 104th walk of her Shocker career to tie for most walks all-time at Wichita State. 2018 American Softball Player of the Year Mackenzie Wright singled through the middle to get two on base but the bats left them stranded.

Lange had another three-up, three-down inning for the defense before singling through the right side in the bottom half of the fourth but again she was left stranded.

In the fifth, Tulsa drew two straight walks with a standup triple by Hollingsworth getting both home to push the Golden Hurricane's lead to three.

Bailee Nickerson led off the bottom half by reaching second base following a throwing error, Madison Perrigan singled to get runners on the corners with a Luellen infield single getting Nickerson home to cut the Tulsa lead to 3-1. The RBI made Luellen the first Shocker softball athlete to reach 150 career runs batted in. Tulsa pitcher Emily Watson responded with three straight strikeouts to keep the Golden Hurricane in the lead.

Lange left two Tulsa runners on base in the sixth before reaching first base in the bottom half on a wild pitch strikeout but again the Shocker bats left her there.

A leadoff single in the seventh followed by a two-out walk got two on base for Tulsa but a deep foul out to Morgan Palmer in left field got out of the inning. Perrigan had her second hit of the day to lead off the bottom half, a shot to left center, with Wright drawing a walk to get two on with two outs before the last batter went down swinging to give Tulsa the quarterfinal victory.

The Shockers close out the season with a 30-21 record and now wait to see if they receive an at-large bid to an NCAA Regional Site on Selection Sunday, May 13. Broadcast live on ESPN2 at 9:00 p.m. CT, the show will select teams competing at the Regional sites held May 18-20, on 16 campus sites. At each campus site, a four-team, double-elimination tournament will be conducted and the 16 winning teams advanced to the Super Regionals.