HAMMOND – The Southeastern Louisiana softball team closes its 2010 season this weekend, hosting Texas A&M-Corpus Christi for a three-game Southland Conference series at North Oak Park.
The Lady Lions (11-34, 3-22 Southland) will welcome the visiting Islanders (32-20, 13-14 Southland) for the series that opens with a 3 p.m. doubleheader on Saturday and concludes on Sunday with a 12 p.m. contest. Saturday’s opening game will be televised on a tape delay by the Southeastern Channel (Charter Channel 18) and live stats for the series will be available at www.LionSports.net.
Southeastern will be celebrating Senior Day on Sunday. Lady Lion seniors
Amber Freeman,
Catherine Gunther,
Chelsea Takacs and
Jenna Yoder will be honored prior to first pitch.
The Lady Lions are hitting .236 as a team on the year. Junior
Katie Duhe leads the team with a .325 batting average, a .509 slugging percentage and a .381 on-base percentage. The reigning Southland Hitter of the Week has a current 11-game hitting streak – three off the school record held by current Lady Lion assistant coach
Karin Smith Gadberry. Sophomore
Jordan Logan leads the team with 47 hits and is hitting .309 for the year.
Southeastern has seen an increase in its power numbers in recent weeks and has hit 25 home runs as a team. Sophomore
Meghan Gomez leads the team with seven home runs, followed by Duhe with five, as well as sophomore
Katelyn Thomason and freshman
Kelsey Nichols with four apiece.
Duhe has driven in a team-high 20 runs on the year, followed by Gomez (17 RBI) and Thomason (13 RBI). Gomez’s 22 runs lead the team, while Duhe and Logan have found the plate 17 and 16 times, respectively.
The same hitters have also been the most productive during Southland Conference play. Duhe (.387, 4 HR, 13 RBI), Logan (.309), Gomez (.300, 6 HR, 13 RBI), Nichols (3 HR) and Thomason (3 HR, 11 RBI) have been the team’s most effective bats versus league foes.
Thomason (5-10, 4.67 ERA), Gunther (0-6, 5.42 ERA, 1 save) and freshman
Kati Morse (2-12, 6.13 ERA) have split the starting duties for the Lady Lions. Junior
Bailey Zievert (2-0, 3.36 ERA), freshman
Elise Kittrell (1-2, 6.53 ERA), sophomore
Vicki Honeycutt (1-3, 7.55 ERA) and Yoder (0-1, 9.19 ERA) round out a Lady Lion staff that has a 5.52 combined team ERA.
The Southeastern pitching staff will have its hands full with a Texas A&M-Corpus Christi team that boasts a robust .322 average. Junior Hannah Schwarz leads the team with a .406 batting average and is one of seven Islander regulars, along with junior Caley Jeter (.393), sophomore Cassie Redman (.345), sophomore Sandy Schumann (.321), junior Kacie Smith (.318), senior Margo Hurdt (.307) and junior Lauren Dodson (.301), hitting .300 or above.
Hurdt and junior Brittany Tucker share the team lead with eight home runs, as nine Islanders have homered this season and A&M-Corpus Christi has hit 33 round trippers as a team. Hurdt also holds a slight team lead with 33 RBI, edging Tucker (32 RBI) and Jeter (30 RBI).
The Islanders have combined for a team earned run average of 3.73. Junior Elena Crabtree (14-11, 3.39 ERA, 5 saves) and senior Addie Tallman (12-7, 3.58 ERA) have handle the majority of the pitching duties. Hurdt (5-2, 5.07 ERA, 1 save) and senior Morgan Seals (1-0, 4.50 ERA) have also seen limited time in the circle for the Islanders.
Southeastern is 4-5 all-time versus Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, which joined the Southland Conference prior to the 2007 season. The Lady Lions took two out of three from the Islanders in the first series meeting, but Texas A&M-Corpus Christi has rebounded to take two of three from the Lady Lions in each of the last two seasons.