After dominating Southland play all season, McNeese State and Southeastern Louisiana will play for the conference tournament title and the conference’s automatic bid to the NCAA tournament today.

Play begins at noon at Cowgirl Diamond. The Cowgirls (43-14), who have won their last nine games, are undefeated in tournament play and get the championship with a win. A Southeastern (46-13) win would force a winner-take-all game immediately following the first game.

“We are in a good position but we still have to win a game,” head coach James Landreneau said after the Cowgirls advanced to the title game. “We are going to be facing a good team and we have to finish this.”

McNeese, the regular-season champion, beat the Lions 6-2 Thursday night in the semifinal round. The Lions rebounded Friday, beating Lamar 8-0 in five innings in an elimination game.

In Thursday’s game, McNeese scored four runs in the bottom of the sixth inning. Kaylee Lopez’s pinch-hit single scored Mariana Torres with the go-ahead run. Alayis Seneca added a two-run triple and Reese Reyna singled to score Seneca.

Lopez also had the winning hit in McNeese’s first game of the tournament, hitting a walk-off double to score Seneca in the bottom of the seventh in a 2-1 win over Texas-A&M-Corpus Christi on Wednesday.

“This is an exciting time to play,” Seneca said. “I want to have this feeling again. I want to win for this group.

“It doesn’t matter who we are playing, it is about us. We worry about how we play.”

Ashley Vallejo (17-8, 2.22 ERA) allowed seven hits and struck out four in a complete game win.

In two tournament games, Seneca and Reyna, the top two hitters in the batting order, have combined for nine hits in 14-at bats with five runs scored and four runs batted in.

McNeese’s lone series loss in the regular season was at Southeastern Louisiana, where the Lions swept a doubleheader before McNeese salvaged the final game of the series.

“Southeastern can really hit the ball,” Landreneau said. “They have a strong lineup and we will have to limit our mistakes.”

NCAA Tournament pairings will be announced Sunday. McNeese may have a shot to get in without the automatic bid. According to D1softball.com, they are ranked 39th in the college ratings percentage index rankings. Southeastern would have a lesser chance of getting an at-large bid, as the Lions entered Friday 55th in the RPI rankings.

The tournament field is made up of 64 teams, with 32 teams receiving automatic bids and the remainder of the field chosen by the NCAA selection committee.

Freelance writer Jim Gazzolo contributed to this story.