Softball prepares for its season finale against Stephen F. Austin this weekend. The Wildcats are 2-4 in their last two series, with all but one of the losses being decided by two runs or less.
The Lumberjacks are also 2-4 in their last six games, boasting an overall record of 17-30 and 9-12 in Southland play, ACU is 29-20 record and 17-7 in conference play.
ACU is coming off one of its tougher series during conference play, as it lost a series at home for just the second time this season. However, the Wildcats avoided a sweep thanks to a brilliant, five-hit, shutout performance from junior Hannah Null.
Freshmen pitcher Sidney Holman leads the conference in wins with an 18-6 record and is second in strikeouts with 151, Null ranks fifth with 121 and is 11-14 on the year. Lumberjack pitcher Callee Guffey is 9-11 on the year, has 86 strikeouts and ranks 10th in conference.
Offensively, junior Peyton Hedrick has been impressive all season as she leads the Wildcat offense with 61 hits and 14 home runs with a .384 batting average. SFA’s offensive star Brittany Lewis, enters the weekend match up with 49 hits and 7 homers.
“They are in the middle of the conference standings,” senior outfielder Alli Spivey said. “They have some big hitters but like I’ve said we just have to take care of us. Be good on defense and offense, along with pitching and we can come away with three wins this weekend.”
The Wildcats went 9-6 in the month of April and swept two out of three conference series and suffered just two losses in a 10-game stretch that included a win over North Texas at Poly Wells Field.
“We can’t take them lightly. We need to take care of the little things early on and carry it through the seventh inning,” senior third basemen Casey May-Huff said. “The past few series we’ve been too focused on the big picture, but at practice this week we really emphasized taking one game at a time. It’s important that we do that especially against teams like this.”
The series begins Friday Poly Wells Field at 5 p.m., as the team will honor its seniors in what will likely be their final games as Wildcats. However, ACU could potentially make an NIT tournament appearance if it wins out and Nicholls State loses one or more game, and if McNeese State wins the conference tournament next weekend.
Hedrick and Brown will also have the chance to make history, as Hedrick needs just one home run and Brown needs four hits to break the all-time records of each.
