Little Falls, NJ (5/1/07) – Sophomore shortstop JENNIFER JIMENEZ (Linden, NJ/Linden) belted a one-out, two-run walk-off homer in the bottom of the eighth inning as sixth-ranked and top-seeded Montclair State edged No. 6 seed Rowan University, 2-1 in the opening round of the 2007 New Jersey Athletic Conference Tournament at the MSU Softball Stadium on Tuesday afternoon.

Jimenez' 12 th home run of the season sent the Red Hawks into the next round where they will face backyard rival and No. 4 seed William Paterson at 1:30 pm on Friday, May 4 as the remainder of the tournament now shifts to Montclair State. The MSU-WPU contest will be the second of three games on Friday as Rowan will face No. 5 seed Richard Stockton in the first elimination game at 11:00 am . Richard Stockton fell to No. 2 seed Ramapo, 3-2 while William Paterson dropped a 4-1 decision to defending league and national champion Rutgers-Camden. Ramapo and Rutgers-Camden, the No. 3 seed will square off in the final game of the day on Friday at 4:00 pm .

The winner of the NJAC Tournament receives and automatic bid to the NCAA Division III Softball Championship which gets underway next week.

Meeting for the third time in the last three days, the Red Hawks and Profs battled through seven scoreless innings as MSU starter CAROLYN MCCREA ( Wharton , NJ /Jefferson) and Rowan's Amanda Riegel ( Millville , NJ /Sacred Heart) each allowed four hits while matching zeroes until the extra inning.

In the top of the eighth, Stacey Haas ( Florence , NJ / Florence ) led off with an infield single and Jamie Assini ( Deptford , NJ / East Brunswick ) walked. Lauren Navarro ( West Milford , NJ / West Milford ) sacrifice the runners over and MSU intentionally walked Kristin Wallace ( Glassboro , NJ / Washington Township ) , who was 3-for-3 in the game to that point, to load the bases. Jen Lake ( Carneys Point , NJ /Penns Grove) lofted a sacrifice fly to score Haas with the first run of the game as the other runners moved up. McCrea then got out of the inning with a ground out.

With three outs to go, Riegel retired the first batter on a ground out, but MAUREEN SHOCKLEY (Magnolia, NJ/Triton) lined a single to center field setting the stage for Jimenez, who had already victimized Rowan on Saturday as she delivered the game-winning single in the bottom of the seventh in a 7-6 win by MSU to complete a doubleheader sweep that gave the Red Hawks the No. 1 seed. Riegel jumped ahead in the count before Jimenez drove a 1-2 pitch over the fence in straightaway centerfield for the game-winning runs. It was the 12 th round-tripper of the year for Jimenez and the 29 th of her career, one behind Kari McDonnell's career mark of 30 from 2002-2005.

The homer made a winner out of McCrea, who improved to 27-3, the most wins by an MSU pitcher since Sue McCarville won 27 during the 1999 campaign. McCrea struck out two and walked four. Riegel took the loss to fall to 10-9. She fanned five and issued three walks.

Shockley finished 3-for-4 for Montclair State .