Texas A&M Scores Five Unanswered Runs to Upset Alabama

For the first time this season, Alabama softball lost to an unranked opponent.

Texas A&M scored five unanswered runs to take down the No. 2 Crimson Tide 6-4 at Davis Diamond in College Station Friday night. It was the first time this year the Aggies have won the opening game of an SEC series.

Alabama brought the tying run to the plate in the top of the seventh, but like every other inning outside of the third, could not bring across any runs.

After the Aggies took the early lead on a solo home run for Makinzy Herzog, the Crimson Tide responded in the third inning with four runs. After Ashley Prange and Jenna Lord reached with singles, the inning was extended on an A&M error to load the bases.

Kaylee Tow and Megan Bloodworth came through with RBI hits to give Alabama the 4-1 lead in the third. However, the Crimson Tide defense quickly let A&M get back into the game in the bottom half of the inning.

Two costly fielding errors from Prange and Tow allowed the Aggies to put two runs back on the board and cut into the lead 4-3. Texas A&M fully retook the lead in the bottom of the fifth with back to back two out hits from Trinity Cannon and Morgan Smith to put the Aggies up 6-4.

Alabama had the best chance to respond in the next half inning after Tow led off with a walk, and Bloodworth cracked a single to centerfield that gave the Crimson Tide two runners in scoring position with no outs. However, the bottom three spots of the lineup could not bring them in, and Alabama's chances for a comeback fizzled out. The bottom third of Alabama's lineup went 0-9 on the night.

Montana Fouts was not given a ton of help from her defense on the night, but for the sixth time in conference play this season, she gave up at least four earned runs. She did finish with 11 strikeouts.

The Crimson Tide (38-7, 13-6 SEC) has not lost an SEC series since opening weekend and will look to get back in the series against the Aggies (25-17, 4-12 SEC) Saturday at 6 p.m. The game will be broadcast on SEC Network.