Shocker SB at Shocker Softball Classic

[flyingMoose]

For the first time in several years, the Shockers are hosting their own tournament. In addition to the Shocks, teams coming are San Diego State, UMKC, North Dakota, Iowa State and Northern Illinois. With six teams in the field and only one playing field, the tournament starts Thursday afternoon with the Shockers playing San Diego State at 330pm followed by a game against UMKC.

San Diego State have a record of 13-7 including a shutout of Oklahoma State. They have a 1-4 mark against ranked teams. The Aztecs, who are receiving votes in the USA Softball poll, were picked to win their third consecutive Mountain West title. Danielle O'Toole pitches three-fourths of their inning and has an ERA 1.51 and almost a strike out per inning. Patrice Johnson has seven home runs.

UMKC have a 5-9 mark. The Roos were picked fifth in the six-team WAC and have two players on the Pre-Season All-Conference Team.

North Dakota have a record of 0-5, opening their season two weekends ago in Florida. The Fighting Sioux were picked last of the seven teams in the Big Sky Conference.

Iowa State have a record of 14-4 against a not-so-strong schedule. Two of their wins are over Indiana State. The Cyclones were picked last of the seven softball-playing teams in the Big 12. Katie Johnson has pitched over ninety percent of their innings.

Northern Illinois have a 6-5 record, including a loss to Evansville. The Huskies staff is led by Jessica Sturm, a Goddard product.

No Tournament Central has been posted, but the schedule is given below.

Thursday

330pm - WSU v SDSU
600pm - WSU v UMKC

Friday

1030am - SDSU v UMKC
100pm - NDU v UMKC
330pm - SDSU v ISU
600pm - WSU v NDU

Saturday

1030am - NDU v ISU
100pm - UMKC - ISU
330pm - SDSU v NIU
600pm - UMKC - NIU

Sunday

1000am - SDSU v NDU
1230pm - NDU v NIU
300pm - WSU v ISU
530pm - WSU v NIU

[1972Shocker]

Thursday's weather looks decent if the field is dry enough. Friday looks good. Saturday looks kind of iffy. Sunday looks good.

The late games which all WSU and/or other cold-weather schools will not doubt be a little chilly. Hopefully, the winds stay reasonably calm. That can make all the difference in the world.

[Hovpen]

Interesting to see if the fields are bad outside if they take this indoors? I know several smaller colleges in the area are playing at the Academy this week due to field conditions just to get some kind of competition in. Haven't been invited to watch any winter tournaments there but I think the new facility at WSU can play indoors.

[flyingMoose]

The late games which all WSU and/or other cold-weather schools will not doubt be a little chilly.

San Diego State is wondering, "What were we thinking about?" On the other hand, the tournament they hosted last weekend was rained out after an opening round on Thursday.

The Aztecs appear to easily be the class of this tournament. Patrice Jackson, their home run leader and a senior, is from Kansas City. So I assume this is her "senior tournament" as they have no one else on their roster from east of the Rockies and only one other player from outside California.

[flyingMoose]

Tournament Central

[Hovpen]

Watching Seward County and Butler on computer and its 67 degrees in Liberal and everyone in the stands is in shirt sleeves. (Jealous) I like the graphic on the Tournament page. Looks good and has all the info on it. Now if they were just streaming the games.

[1972Shocker]

Interesting to see Kaitlyn Malone starting in the circle against San Diego State.

[Hovpen]

She was 4-1 going in, although her era is a little high for softball, but so far, its been a close game.

[1972Shocker]

Shocks going to lose a game big that they probably should have won. They seem close but it seems like the just lose focus every now and then some little things steamroll into big things.

In the 3rd with 2-outs and one runner on base via an infield hit Kaitlyn walked the SDS lead off hitter intentionally and the gave up another walk to load the bases and the gave up a bases clearing double. SDS was up 3-1 at that point.

The Shocks came back to tie the score at 4-4 with 1 in the 4th and 2 in the 5th. In the bottom of the 6th they got a lead off double from Ali Vandever and then failed to advance her and were unable to score.

Sloan Anderson relieved Kaitlyn to start the 6th. In the 7th Sloan got the first two batters on a fly to CF and a grounder to SS. She then gave up a walk. The inning was then extended on an error by Kelly Spring at SS. Sloan after getting ahead 1-2 walked the next hitter to load the bases. Sloan again got ahead in the count 1-2 before giving up a grand slam home run. If that wasn't bad enough SDS followed that up with a single, a homer and a double before the brought Kaitlyn back in the game to relieve Sloan. Kaitlyn promptly gave up a single to RF but the SDS runner from 2nd was thrown out at HP to end the inning.

SDS 11 - WSU 4 heading into the bottom of the 7th.

Shocks scratch out a meaningless run in the bottom of the 7th making the final score SDS 11- WSU 5.

[flyingMoose]

I was at this game. I had been chatting with an SDS dad, and when Sloan came into the game, I told him what was going to happen in the seventh. Unfortunately, I was right.

Although Kaitlyn hung around for awhile, she was no mystery. There were a number of line drive outs and hard-hit ground ball outs. We scored the five runs, but we did not see the San Diego State ace. But we did look good swinging the bats against the two pitchers we saw. Melanie's homer to start the Shocker scoring was off a change-up.

Kaitlyn had two illegal pitches called in this game and one in the first two innings I watched of the UMKC game.

[1972Shocker]

Shocks were on the cusp of a run rule win over UMKC leading the 'Roos 11-2 with two outs and nobody on in the top of the 5th. Only needing 1 more out to close out the game.

Kaitlyn who has pitched the all the way unfortunately gave up an infield single and then a home run to allow the game to continue with the Shocks up 11-4 going into the bottom of the 5th.

May be my imagination but it seems like Shocker pitchers have a tough time closing out AB's and innings when they really need to. Just don't seem to have an out pitch they can go to.

[flyingMoose]

UMKC 4-12(5) Shockers

Kaitlyn also started this game. The Roos scored on a single, double (a pop fly to medium right center, an area left uncovered by our slap hitter defense) and wild pitch. We ended the inning on a strike out and beautiful pick off at third by Melanie.

The Shocks took the lead with two runs in the bottom of the first on an infield single by Cacy, double by Kelli, run-scoring single by PaigeM and ground out by Brittany.

UMKC tied the game in the second on a single and double into the left field corner. Again the Shocks retook the lead in the bottom half on a single by Ashley and two walks to load the bases, PaigeM then delivered two runs with a single.

The Roos threatened in the third with a double but the runner was thrown out at the plate by Ashley following a single. The Shockers took command of the game by scoring four in the bottom of the inning. Brittany led off with a home run. Three errors led to two runs and Liz delivered the fourth run of the inning with a double.

The beat went on in the fourth inning. Brittany was hit by a pitch and when Melanie doubled, UMKC made a pitching change. But a single by Ashley scored a run and Cacy scored two more with her single. Shockers, 11-2 after four.

With two outs, Kaitlyn gave up a single and homer in the fifth to evade, for the moment, the game ending by the runs-ahead rule. In the bottom of the fifth, the Shocks got runners to second and third using a walk, error and sac bunt. Ashley then delivered a game-ending single.

Kaitlyn gave up nine hits on the game and had only one strike out. Ashley had three hits and Cacy and PaigeM each had two hits. Cacy, PaigeM, Brittany and Ashley had multi-RBI games.

[1972Shocker]

Shocks end it in the bottom of the 5th on a run-scoring single by Ashley Johnson (who was 3-4 in the game) with 2 outs to close out the 12-4 run rule.

Kaitlyn gets the victory with a 5-inning complete game.

The Shocks only outhit UMKC 11-9 but took advantage of 5 walks, a hit batter and 5 UMKC errors to pad their scoring. While Kaitlyn did give up 5 hits she did not walk anyone and the Shocks played error-free ball behind her.

[flyingMoose]

Oh, Stacy Nuveman, a three-time Olympian (catcher) for the USA, is the associate head coach for the Aztecs.

[1972Shocker]

Oh, Stacy Nuveman, a three-time Olympian (catcher) for the USA, is the associate head coach for the Aztecs.

She would be hard to miss. Not a small woman.