Valdosta State’s Andi Braswell hits the ball against Albany State Monday at the VSU Softball Complex.

VALDOSTA — The Valdosta State Lady Blazers’ softball team surpassed the 50-win mark with a sweep of the Albany State Golden Rams Monday evening.

The Lady Blazers won the first game 9-1 and game 2 5-0 to end the regular season 51-6 overall.

“The record at VSU was 49 (wins),” VSU head coach Thomas Macera said. “So it’s a new record at VSU with 51 now. It’s great. We have a young squad here. We have high expectations, even with a young squad. We try to be realistic, so for these girls to win 50 games, it’s a big deal, especially with the conference and region we are in.”

The doubleheader against Albany State (35-30) was VSU’s last warm-up act before the team heads to Southaven, Miss., for the Gulf South Conference tournament this weekend. The Lady Blazers are the No. 1 seed from the GSC East and will play Ouachita Baptist at noon on Friday.

“It helps,” Macera said about the two wins over Albany State. “We’re trying to host a region tournament also, so any time you can pick up some region points, it really helps. It helps to play, too, instead of sitting out. Some teams are sitting out this week, and I think that really hurts you.”

The first game between the Lady Blazers and the Lady Rams was a pitchers’ duel that turned into a rout, eventually ending via the mercy rule in the fifth inning.

Andi Braswell led off the first inning with a home run, but after that, Lady Rams pitcher Sasha Reece settled down over the next two innings.

Lady Blazers starter Brianna Collis was better, though. Collis (13-1) didn’t allow a runner past first base until the fifth inning. She pitched a complete game, allowing one run and four hits.

Leading 1-0 in the bottom of the fourth, the Lady Blazers blew the game open. Reece gave up a leadoff walk to Alyssa Shirey, who moved to second on a sacrifice bunt by Stephanie Carlson. Becca Aszman drew a walk and Collis reached on an error to load the bases. That brought up April Hutchens, who hammered the first pitch she saw over the left field fence for a grand slam to make it 5-0 Lady Blazers.

ASU got on the board in the top of the fifth on an RBI single by Amber Bailey to make it 5-1.

The Lady Blazers answered right back in the bottom of the fifth with four more runs to take an eight-run lead, and end the game by run rule.

With two outs, Carlson homered to center to make it 6-1, then Aszman singled and Collis walked to put runners on first and second. Hutchens knocked an RBI single that scored Aszman to make it 7-1. Collis advanced to third and Hutchens went to second on the throw home.

Collis and Hutchens came around to score to make it 9-1 on a game-ending two-run single by Clare Wamsley.

“After they go through the lineup once or twice, we can really get on a pitcher,” Macera said.

Hutchens led the way at the plate, going 2-for-3 with five RBIs. Braswell went 3-for-3 and was a triple shy of the cycle.

In game 2, the Lady Blazers got another strong pitching performance, this time from Margaret Carter. Carter (16-3) went the distance, pitching a three-hit shutout. She struck out 12 hitters, including the last four of the game.

The Lady Blazers scored one run in every inning except the third off of Golden Rams starter Ashia Merideth.

Shirey got the Lady Blazers on the board in the first with a two-out double that scored Melessa Jackson.

In the second, Wamsley singled home Collis with one out to make it 2-0. Wamsley was at it again in the fourth, when she hit a solo home run with two outs.

Marti Littlefield picked up her 99th RBI of the season in the fifth with a run-scoring double that plated Jackson.

VSU ended its scoring in the sixth when Braswell singled with two outs to score Hutchens.

Wamsley went 2-for-3 with two RBIs from the No. 8 spot in the lineup. Shirey was 2-for-3 with a pair of doubles.

Besides timely hitting and strong pitching, the Lady Blazers had something else to point to in their sweep of Albany State.

“Both (Collis and Carter) pitched well,” Macera said. “We played defense behind them. We only made one error tonight. That’s been our biggest problem. It hasn’t been pitching or hitting. The defense has been letting us down, and it didn’t today. They took out the trash. We call routine plays taking out the trash, and they did that tonight.”