SPRINGFIELD, ILL. – Junior Carly Kingery tossed her second career no-hitter and came up one batter short of a perfect game as the No. 6 seed University of Missouri-St. Louis softball team opened NCAA Tournament play with a 4-0 upset of No. 3 McKendree on Friday.
 
Kingery struck out 10 in her seventh shutout of the season and held a perfect game for six and two-thirds of an inning until hitting Brooke Gajewski for the Bearcats' only runner of the game.
 
UMSL improves to 34-22 overall and advances to tomorrow's winner's game against either No. 2 seed Illinois Springfield or No. 7 Saginaw Valley State. McKendree (38-17) will play the loser of that game in an elimination contest.
 
Junior Reagan Osborn gave the Tritons an early offensive punch, delivering a three-run homer in the fourth inning. UMSL left a combined six runners on base in the previous three innings and nearly made it 1-0 in the third when senior Jennah Perryman was thrown out at home on a fielder's choice.
 
The Tritons finished with eight hits with seven players recording at least one hit. Freshman Sapphire Munoz tallied a team-high two hits.
 
Junior Madi Sundling drove in the fourth run in the fifth inning on a sac fly.
 
TRITON TIDBITS: The no-hitter for Kingery was the second of her career and gave her career win No. 51… Kingery also surpassed 500 career strikeouts… the Tritons improve to17-14 all-time in NCAA Tournament games, including 13-8 in the last six seasons… UMSL has won its opening NCAA Tournament game for the fifth time in the last six years… the Tritons improve to 2-1 this season against McKendree as the two teams split their GLVC opening doubleheader earlier this season.