Ten innings would be one too many for a baseball game, but the LSU women’s softball team doesn’t play baseball. 

The No. 10 Tigers (3-0) play softball, and their 10th inning win against Tulsa (3-1) on Saturday in the first game of their second double-header of the Tiger Classic ran, not one, but four innings longer than a full game.

LSU senior pitcher Rachele Fico and Tulsa senior pitcher Lacey Middlebrooks went toe-to-toe for all ten innings, but in the end the Tigers’ 2012 All-American proved to have more stamina to finish the marathon game.

Fico pitched 10 shutout innings, giving up five hits and tallying 14 strikeouts along the way. In her first two starts of the season, she still has not given up a run in 15 innings of work.

Middlebrooks out-dueled Fico in the hits column, holding LSU to just two hits the entire night, but her control faltered late in the game, ending with seven walks.

The game was settled in the tenth inning with the help of international softball tiebreak rules. Each team was allowed to start the 10th inning with the last runner out from the ninth inning at second base.

For LSU that runner was Jacee Blades. Middlebrooks walked Blades home for the game-winning run and the only run of the game, with three consecutive walks.

In the top half of the 10th, Fico retired the three batters she faced with two strikeouts and a groundout, successfully keeping Tulsa’s free runner at second from advancing.

LSU junior third basemen Tammy Wray was credited with the game winning RBI with her walk in the bottom of the 10th. In the Tigers first three games of the season, she has amassed four RBI’s — almost half of her nine from last season.

The Tigers have two games remaining in its season opening Tiger Classic. LSU will meet Hampton later Saturday night, and then the Tigers will close out the weekend with a second matchup with No. 22 North Carolina on Sunday afternoon. 

The Tigers defeated the Tar Heels with an 8-0, run-rule victory in just five innings on Friday. Fico was the winning pitcher against both North Carolina and Tulsa.