NOTE: DUE TO IMPENDING WEATHER ISSUES, THE SCHEDULE FOR WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY HAVE CHANGED.
WEDNESDAY WILL BE A SINGLE GAME AT 2:30 P.M. THURSDAY WILL BE A DOUBLEHEADER (NOON AND 2:30 P.M.). AT THIS POINT, ONLY THE SECOND GAME OF THE SERIES WILL BE BROADCAST ON ESPN+. A NEW LINK IS FORTHCOMING.
MOREHEAD, Ky. – Morehead State softball is returning from a 10-day layoff to host Bowling Green for three games at the University Field, starting with a doubleheader on Wednesday at noon and 2:30 p.m., and then a single game on Thursday at noon. It will be the team's home openers and the first three contests of a six-game home stand, the second-longest such stretch this season.
"We're looking forward to the opportunity to get a few more games under us," head coach
Megan Griffith said. "Our keys to win the series are playing clean defense and making the routine plays routinely. We will need to stick to our plan offensively and have a high level of execution at the plate and on the bases. It'll be a good contest to get us going right before conference starts."
Morehead State (4-6) last played at the Mercer Bear Invitational, where the team finished 1-4. It is the longest in-season gap between games since also having 10 days off between March 22 and April 1, 2023. The Eagles are on a four-game slide.
Wednesday's games will be the earliest regular-season home opener since the Eagles hosted Eastern Illinois on March 6, 2021. Last year, MSU hosted Alice Lloyd in an exhibition doubleheader on Feb. 10.
The Eagles finished 2023 with a 3-10 mark at the University Field and enter the week having dropped their last five home games of the '23 campaign.
A pair of newcomers lead the team offensively. Junior outfielder
Darlene Montoya is batting .394, with a .576 slugging percentage and a .394 on base percentage. She also has six doubles and seven RBI. Freshman middle infielder
Sela Pickford is batting .324, with five doubles and five RBI. She adds a .559 slugging percentage and a .343 on base percentage.
Montoya ranks eighth nationally and second in the Ohio Valley Conference in doubles per game at 0.60, while Pickford is not far behind with 0.50 doubles per game, ranking third in the OVC and 14th in Division I. Pickford also sits fourth in the league and 84th nationally in sacrifice hits per game at 0.20.
Senior outfielder
Trinity Spear has a squad best three home runs, paces the team with 10 runs scored, and is tied for the lead in RBI with seven. Junior utility player
Ilencia Lightbody tops the Eagles with 10 walks, four stolen bases and a .536 on base percentage.
Spear is fifth in the OVC and 123rd in Division I in triples per game at 0.10, second in the league and 65th nationally in runs per game at 1.00, and first in the conference and 66th in Division I in home runs per game at 0.30. Lightbody also is ranked in three categories: on base percentage (0.536, third in OVC, 66th in Division I), stolen bases per game (0.44, third in OVC and 105th in Division I) and walks per game (1.11, first in OVC, fifth in Division I).
Freshman
Addie Stem and sophomore
Jessie Begley have both pitched in nine games. Stem is 2-5 with a 3.91 ERA and one save. She has struck out 21 and walked 20. Opponents are hitting .250 against her. Begley is 2-1, with a 5.86 ERA, 13 strikeouts and 13 walks. Opposing batters have posted a .351 average with her in the circle. Freshman
Cassiti Baroni has missed every game to date but has begun practicing and could see action this week.
Bowling Green (1-7) enters the series on a seven-game skid, dropping all four games it played at this past weekend's Hoosier Classic. Host Indiana won 7-3 (Friday) and 8-0 in six innings (Saturday), then Valparaiso captured victories of 5-3 (Saturday) and 12-4 in five innings (Sunday). Prior to that, the Falcons fell to Furman (5-3), Louisville (11-3 in six innings) and Coastal Carolina (11-3 in five innings) in the Battle at the Beach in Conway, S.C. from Feb. 24-25. The team's lone win was against Furman, 7-3, in its season opener on Feb. 24 at Coastal Carolina's tournament.
As a team, the Falcons are hitting .228, have three homers, six stolen bases, own a 7.71 ERA and a .971 fielding percentage.
Senior catcher Regan Williamson leads the team with a .458 batting average, a .792 slugging percentage, eight RBI, two home runs and a .481 on base percentage. Freshman middle infielder Cameron Kaufman is next at .353, with a .412 slugging percentage and a .289 on base percentage. Senior outfielder Peyton Dolejs is hitting .300 and adds seven RBI. Sophomore shortstop Ashley Chevalier tops the squad with three stolen bases.
In the circle, senior Taylor Turner is 1-3 with a 4.97 ERA in 25.1 innings. She has 14 strikeouts and 17 walks. Junior Scarlet Anderson is 0-3, with an 8.40 ERA, seven walks and one strikeout in 11.2 innings. Three others have pitched this season, but none have logged more than six total innings.
BGSU holds a 7-1-1 series advantage, including a 3-0-1 mark at MSU. The teams first played in a March 11, 2003, doubleheader in Morehead and the Falcons came away with an 8-6, eight-inning victory. The second game ended in a 5-5 tie after five frames. In 2004, they faced off in a late February tournament at Mercer, with Bowling Green capturing a 7-4 advantage. In 2012, BGSU notched a 6-3 win in a tournament at Western Kentucky.
The lone Eagle victory occurred in the first of two meetings in 2016. The 6-5 decision came at Cleveland State, with the second matchup a week later favoring the Falcons 11-1 at the Phyllis Rafter Memorial in Kennesaw, Ga. The two also squared off at the Morehead State Classic on March 16-17, 2019. Bowling Green won the outings 10-4 and 9-2. Most recently, they met at the UE Invitational in Evansville on March 6, 2022, with BGSU earning a 5-2 victory.
The first and third games will be televised on ESPN+. The links are:
https://www.espn.com/espnplus/player/_/id/6bf4b5ad-fc74-4dcb-a551-b61100426725 for game one and
https://www.espn.com/espnplus/player/_/id/ca9fbf3a-c9b0-49f6-bc0e-23ab94ccc162 for game three. The second game of the doubleheader will not be streamed.
Morehead State will stay at home to begin its OVC slate by hosting Tennessee State in a three-game series on Saturday and Sunday. The Eagles and Tigers will face off at noon and 2:30 p.m. on Saturday and at 1 p.m. on Sunday.
