GREENVILLE, S.C. - Sophomore Stephanie Field collected three hits and senior Lana Mackey tossed a complete-game three-hitter to lift Furman to a 2-1 victory over Samford in the opening game of a three-game Southern Conference softball series Friday afternoon at Pepsi Stadium.

Mackey allowed just one run on three hits, struck out seven batters and did not issue a walk to improve to 2-4 in the circle.  The Perry, Ga., native fanned six consecutive batters during the middle innings and worked around two seventh-inning singles to guide Furman (3-7, 1-3 SoCon) to its first league win of 2010.

Field, who had her eight-game hitting streak snapped on Wednesday at Georgia, bounced back by registering three singles, including a two-out base knock to left field in the bottom of the fourth to plate Alyssa Williams with the eventual winning run.

Samford (8-12, 1-3 SoCon) jumped out in front in the top half of the third on Aaren Fisher's solo homer to left field.  Furman's Brythe Blankenship singled to start the bottom of the fourth and moved to second when Williams reached on a fielder's choice.  Senior Megan Schonhar followed with a single to left-center to drive in Blankenship with the tying run.  Two batters later, Field looped a base hit into left to score Williams.

Katie England began the seventh inning with a single for Samford, but Mackey got the next two batters to pop out before England was erased trying to take third base on Amanda Jordan's two-out single to shortstop.

Amanda Barrs (1-6) suffered the loss for Samford allowing two tuns on five hits in three-plus innings in the circle.  She walked two Paladins and fanned three.  Kayla Burris hurled three innings of scoreless relief for the Bulldogs.

Furman and Samford conclude their three-game series on Saturday with a doubleheader.  First pitch of game one is set for 1 p.m. with game two scheduled to begin 20 minutes after the conclusion of the first game.

All Furman home games and selected road contests will be available via GameTracker.  Fans can follow Furman action by logging onto www.furmanpaladins.com and following the links on the athletics schedule or by surfing to the Furman softball page.