Lamar Upsets Top-Seeded Northwestern State 6-1
Southland Conference
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FRISCO, Texas – Fifth-seeded Lamar upset top-seeded Northwestern State 6-1 Wednesday night in the Southland Conference Softball Tournament second round at the Lady Demon Diamond in Natchitoches, La. The Lady Cardinals advance to their first ever Southland softball tournament winners bracket semifinals with the victory.
Lamar held tournament host and No. 1 seed Northwestern State to only three hits the entire night, riding strong pitching from freshman starting pitcher Laura Napoli. The Lady Cardinals scored two runs in the first, one in the fifth and three in the sixth to secure the win.
Lamar jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first after catcher Brynn Baca singled but advanced to second on the throw, allowing both left fielder Sarah Ragsdale and second baseman Casey Cromwell to sore. Baca picked up the two RBI.
In the third inning, the Lady Demons earned their lone run of the game with second baseman Micayla Sorosiak’s solo home run deep over the center field wall.
The Lady Cardinals increased their lead to 3-1 by way of a sacrifice fly from center fielder Jenna Holland that drew home third baseman Sable Hankins. In the top of the sixth, Lamar added insurance to its lead through three unearned runs. Designated player Taylor Duck, shortstop Stephanie Meeuwsen and Ragsdale each scored on errors. Both Baca and Hankins had two RBI on the night for the Lady Cardinals.
The Lady Cardinals’ third-team all-conference selection Napoli threw her second complete game of the day. Napoli improved her record to 19-16 on the season, adding another win to her school-record 18th victory earlier today.
Lady Demons starting pitcher and Southland pitcher of the year Mikayla Brown took the loss, being pulled after only throwing for 1.1 innings. Brown drops to 11-3 on the season.
No. 5 Lamar will now take on third-seeded Central Arkansas (33-19, 16-8 Southland) in winners bracket semifinals tomorrow afternoon in Natchitoches, first pitch is slated for 4 p.m. The matchup between the two teams will be the first of the year. The regular-season conference series between the Lady Cardinals and the Bears was cancelled due to inclement weather
Top-seed Northwestern State (33-17, 22-3 Southland) will now play in tomorrow morning’s opening back draw game against No. 6 seed Texas A&M-Corpus Christi. Game time is set for 11 a.m. from the Lady Demon Diamond. This will be the first meeting of the season between the Lady Demons and the Islanders as the two squads did not play during the conference schedule.
The Southland title game is slated for a 2 p.m. start Friday with a possibility of second game for the tournament championship. The 11th game would be played in the event an undefeated team lost in the title game forcing a second game for the tournament championship, upholding the double elimination format. Game 11 start time is to be determined.
For more information on the tournament, including a link to
live stats, please visit
Southland.org. For updates and the most current information throughout the tournament please follow the Southland Conference on twitter at SouthlandSports and use the hashtag “SLCSoftball”.
The first nine games of the 2015 Southland Softball Tournament are being streamed live for free on the Southland Conference Digital Network, including
Southland.org/watch and the league’s mobile and tablet apps. The championship round will be an exclusive presentation of ESPN3, available via
WatchESPN.com and the WatchESPN app. Chris Mycoskie, Assistant Commissioner of Television and Electronic Media for the Southland Conference, will handle play-by play for all games. Three-time Southland softball coach of the year and National Fastpitch Coaches Association Hall of Fame member Yvette Girouard will join him for the championship as the color analyst.
Quotes
Lamar Head Coach Holly Bruder
On the game…
“I’m really excited, this is the way we are capable of playing softball. I tip my hat to third-team all-conference selection Laura Napoli for limiting the top-seed to only three hits.”
Northwestern State Head Coach Donald Pickett
On playing A&M-Corpus Christi…
“They played a great game in the first game and came up short in 13 innings to UCA so they’ll definitely come out with a lot of fight. They have a talented team. Their pitcher looked pretty good today. They’re going to come in ready to play. We need to come in and pick ourselves up and take things a game at a time. That’s all we can do.”
On miscues, difficulties in loss…
“We’ve got to take it pitch-by-pitch. What we did today was let the game speed up on us. We were overthrowing in the circle. The ball wasn’t moving as much. We were trying to do too much at the plate. We weren’t swinging at the pitches we wanted to in the counts we wanted to. We’ve got to keep playing the same game we played all year long. Hopefully we can pick back up and get some momentum tomorrow, pick up a couple wins and survive and advance.”