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TROY, Ala. - Aileen Garcia and Krista Rude were the heroes in Friday's elimination game, as UTA softball advanced into the final three of the Sun Belt Championship tournament on a 2-1, walk-off win against South Alabama. The Mavericks face Texas State with the winner advancing into the SBC Championship game. Start time is pending with weather, but will not begin before 4:30 p.m.

Rude knocked her second single of the day with one out to get things going, advanced to third on a stolen base and an error, and two batters later came in on Garcia's sacrifice fly to centerfield.

"It felt great," Curry said of coming in as the winning run. "We always like to keep things interesting. We just stayed relaxed and knew that we could do it. Aileen hit a deep fly ball, I knew I was going to go four and I just ran as hard as I could."

The win pushed UTA to a 32-25 record and its furthest in the conference tournament since reaching the same point in the 2010 Southland Tournament.

"It feels great," UTA coach Kristie Fox said. "I am just really proud of the way that the girls came out to the tournament and knew it was a brand new season. They have just been fighting every pitch and have had so much energy. The team's chemistry has been great all year and it is clicking at the right time."

Rude would tie with Laura Curry for the game-high in hits as each had a pair and crossed the plate for the team's two runs. Sandra Mendoza provided a RBI on her 37th-career double in the fifth, tying Rebecca Collom for third in UTA history.

Fox sent a combination of pitchers into the circle during the course of the game, each providing quality innings that kept South Alabama to only one run. Sam Clakley earned the win after coming in during the fifth. Clakley's 26th win - tied third in UTA single-season history - came behind 2.1 innings pitched with two strikeouts and only one hit given up.

Senior Sam Montes got the start and allowed just one earned run and three hits in two innings of work. Freshman Mariah Denson followed Montes and tossed 2.2 innings of no-hit ball, striking out two and walking a pair in the fifth before departing.

After a two-out rally in the first helped South Alabama strike first, the teams would be quiet until the bottom of the fifth. Curry knocked a leadoff triple to the warning track, her fifth of the season and tied for fifth in single-season history. Mendoza drove her in with her double in the next at-bat.

South Alabama threatened to spoil the day in the seventh with runners on the corners, however, Clakley induced a groundout to third to calm the chance.

The winner of Texas State and UTA's Elimination Bracket Final will advance into Saturday's Championship game against top-seeded Louisiana at 1 p.m. in a winner-take-all contest to decide the league's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.