Shocker SB v Bradley

[flyingMoose]

The Shockers continue their conference play with a series on Saturday (DH starting at noon) and Sunday (single game starting at noon) at Wilkins Stadium. Both teams enter the weekend at 5-1 in Valley play, tied for first.

Bradley has a overall record of 14-17 in addition to their Valley mark. They have played a more rugged schedule than most Valley teams, losing games to Cal, Stanford, Missouri and Oregon, all ranked teams at the time. In Valley play, they took two of three from Missouri State and swept Evansville.

The top hitters are Mariah Cole (BA of .333 and a slapper by looking at her OPS) and Madeline Lynch-Crumrine (BA of .316 and OPS of .870). Alex Chandler (OPS of .961) and Kathryn Spenn (OPS of .904) are other hitters of note.

In the circle, two pitchers have all but two of their starts. Madeline L-C, who has given the Shocker fits over the years, has an ERA of 2.73 and WHIP of 1.58, while Jaelen Hull has an ERA of 4.38 and a WHIP of 1.79.

For the Shocks, PaigeL (.411, 1.187 and six homers) and Cacy (.393, 1.228 and six homers) continue to lead the offense. Liz and Melanie also have OPS north of .900. Sloan, Katie and Jenni all have ERAs of near 4.00 or worse with only Sloan's WHIP of 1.40 being any distance away from a WHIP of 2.00.

[1972Shocker]

Game 1:

BU.......5R, 8H, 0E, 7LOB
WSU.... 0R, 4H, 0E, 4LOB

Bradley Sr. Madeline Lynch-Crumrine shut the Shockers down on 4 hits while Katie Malone pitched pretty well but her inability to get out #3 in the 3rd and 6th innings were her downfall.

It looked like things were going Katie's way in the 3rd inning when a 1-out Bradley double was turned into the an out at 3B (RF to 2B to 3B) when the runner tried to unsuccessfully to stretch it to a triple leaving the bases empty with 2-outs. However, Katie did not take advantage of the good fortune. A single followed by two walks loaded the bases. Katie then hit the next batter to produce the 1st run of the game. As it turns out, it would be all Lynch-Crumrine needed.

The Shocks did have good scoring opportunities in the 4th and the 5th. Kelli Spring lead off the 4th with and infield single and was advanced to 2nd on a Sac Bunt by Liz Broyles. Paige Luellen flied out to CF with Kelli advancing to third, but Brittany Fortner popped to 2B to end the inning. In the 5th Paige Mason lead off with a single to CF and was sacrificed to 2nd by Melanie Jaegers. However, Ali Vandever popped to 1B and Ashley Johnson struck out to end that opportunity.

Bradley then removed the suspense from the game in the 6th. After giving up a walk and a single Katie got a strike out and a foul pop to 1B but again struggled to get out #3. After a singled to LF Bradley's catcher, Kendall Duffy, cleared the bases with a grand slam homer giving the Braves a 5-0 lead.

After giving up a lead-off single in the 7th, Katie was relieved by Sloan Anderson. Sloan walked the 1st batter she faced then retired the next 3.

The Braves were picked 7th in the Valley preseason poll, one spot above the Lady Shocks. The Shocks need to regroup and take the next two games if they the have designs on moving up in the Valley pecking order.

[1972Shocker]

Game 2:

BU.......5R, 9H, 2E, 5LOB
WSU....6R, 12H, 0E, 7LOB

Starting Pitchers: Jaelen Hull, 5-8 Fr LH for Bradley; Jenni Brooks, 5-6 Fr RH for Wichita State

Bradley got of to a quick start with 2-home runs scoring 3 runs in the top of the 1st for a quick KO on Jenni Brooks. Sloan Anderson entered for Jenni with 2-outs in the 1st.

The Shocks had a great opportunity in the 2nd as they loaded the bases with on outs an infield error and 2 singles. Unfortunately, they could only push across 1 run and that was on a 2-out walk to Cacy Williams to force in the run.

Sloan gave up a 1-out double followed by another Bradley home run in the 3rd to push Bradley's lead to 5-1.

The Shocks wasted a lead off double by Brittany Fortner in the 4th.

Shocks get a lead off single from Cacy Williams in the 5th but again are unable to do anything. Of course, small ball is pretty much not an option at this point.

The Shocks were seemingly dead-in-the-water heading into the bottom of the 7th trailing 5-1 and Avery Johnson grounding out to 2B to lead off the inning.

Cacy Williams doubled and Kelli Spring reached on an error by 2B putting runners at the corners with 1-out.

Liz Broyles followed with an infield single scoring Cacy and advancing Kelli to 2nd. Shocks trail 2-5.

Paige Luellen singled to center loading the bases still with 1-out.

Paige Mason singled to right center scoring Kelli and keeping the bases loaded. Shocks trail 3-5.

At that point Bradley brought in Shocker-killer Madeline L-C to pitch.

Brittany Fortney singled through the right-side scoring Liz Broyles and Paige Luellen scoring to tie the game at 5-5.

Melanie Jaegers then plated Layne Greenlee, who was pinch-running for Paige Mason, with the game-winner on an infield single to SS. Shocks win 6-5.

Hell of a come back by the Lady Shocks and pretty much coincided with the Baseball team's 3-2 walk-off win over #9 CSF across the road at Eck Stadium

That's some major positive mojo happening there.

Hopefully, this rally will carry over to tomorrow's game.

[flyingMoose]

I was able to watch these games but had to leave at the bottom of the seventh of the second game for another engagement. That pretty much explains the lack of punch by the Shocks - nothing happened until I left. My bad!


Game 1

The Shockers were sporting old school stirrups - black with three gold bands edged in white. With me being the fashionista that I am ...

Earlier in the season, I thought Paige Luellen was in the lineup for her bat, and the coaches were hiding her in right field. But Paige made two nice plays in this game. In the Bradley second, she caught a slicing ball at her knees as she was running hard to the right field line, easily doubling off a Brave (in more ways than one) runner who was well around second on her way to third. And then Paige started the relay that cut down the runner trying to stretch her double in the third. The runner was out a ton - not a good decision by the Brave (in more ways than one) coach. Staying with the defense, Cacy made a very nice catch of a foul pop as she charged towards home plate and the dugout.

In the bottom of the fifth with the score still 1-0, Bradley allowed a foul ball to drop down the left field line to prevent Layne from scoring the tying run from third on a sac fly. Ali was subsequently out and Ashley followed, so the strategy worked. The Bradley grand slam in the sixth did not have much, landing in the screen below the scoreboard, but it had enough.

The last out of the game was a screamer that Melanie was robbed on with a great sliding catch by the Bradley left fielder as she moved to the line.

Madeline L-C was obviously effective, and we helped her out by swinging at a lot of pitcher's pitches.

Game 2

Bradley's offensive approach with their swings is to use a pronounced upper cut. Katie got them several times with her rise ball in the first game, but Jenni left pitches waist high and paid for it with the two homers she allowed. Coach B had a pretty quick hook, but if Jenni cannot hit her spots against even an average team, she is going to have trouble.

Not much else going on until the fateful seventh when somebody I know personally was no longer there.

Hopefully, the two hits off L-C to tie and win this game will give us some confidence when we see her again tomorrow. And who will start for us?

[1972Shocker]

Game 3:

Katie in the circle for the Shocks. Madeline Lynch-Crumrine for Bradley.

Shocks drop a bomb on the Shocker killer Madeline L-C with an 8-spot in the 1st inning on 6 hits, 1 walk, 1 HBP and 3 Bradley errors. 2 doubles among the 6 hits, but no home runs. PaigeL did add a solo home run in the 2nd. A 2-out RBI double by Liz Broyles extended the lead to 10-0 after 3. Shocks with a good opportunity to run rule the Braves

[ShockTalk]

Game 3:

Katie in the circle for the Shocks. Madeline Lynch-Crumrine for Bradley.

Shocks drop a bomb on the Shocker killer Madeline L-C with an 8-spot in the 1st inning on 6 hits, 1 walk, 1 HBP and 3 Bradley errors. 2 doubles among the 6 hits, but no home runs. PaigeL did add a solo home run in the 2nd. A 2-out RBI double by Liz Broyles extended the lead to 10-0 after 3. Shocks with a good opportunity to run rule the Braves

Wow!

[1972Shocker]

Bradley scores 3 in the top of the 5th to stave off the run-rule as the game goes to the 6th with the Shocks up 10-3.

[1972Shocker]

Freshman Macklin Hitz (one of my favorite softball names of all time) ends the game in the bottom of the 6th with a 2-out, 3-run home run as the Shocks win 13-3 in 6 innings.

I guess the mojo from yesterday's 7th inning rally in Game 2 did carryover to today's game.

BU......3R, 10H, 5E, 6LOB
WSU..13R, 13H, 0E, 5LOB

Despite Bradley's 5 errors, 10 of the Shocks 13 runs were earned.

The Lady Shocks are doing a good job picking up wins against the bottom half of the league.

Shocks travel to Evansville, picked to finish 9th in the preseason poll, next weekend. So they need to take that series as things will get decidedly tougher over the 2nd half of the conference season.

Evansville did put a 7-0 licking on league favorite UNI today.

[flyingMoose]

Game 3

I arrived in the bottom of the third for this one. The Shock wore black unis today, so the socks were yellow with black bands edged in white.

I was told that Paige's homer was a rope that never got more than fifteen high or so. On the other hand, Macklin's home run was a bomb. It sailed through the top of the tree to the left of the scoreboard and would have cleared the scoreboard had it been on that path.

Paige made another nice play in right. In the top of the sixth, she dove for a line drive in front of her, just missing it, and the ball trickled behind her. She quickly recovered and threw the runner out trying to stretch the hit into a double. On another single hit to her, she almost threw the runner out at first. However, she also went in standing at second base on a sac bunt attempt was forced out.

Katie still leaves too many pitches in the middle of the plate. As long as she continues to do that, her WHIP is going to be near 2.00.

We had a couple of instances that showed (IMO) a lack of class on the part of the Shockers. With a 10-0 lead in the bottom of the fourth, Melanie was thrown out trying to steal second. We are three outs away from a run-rule game - I don't think that steal attempt was necessary. And then in the bottom of the sixth, Layne goes out to first base to pinch-run. Some students are sitting in the box seats immediately east of the dugout and are chanting (and maybe there is some music?). So Layne dances out to first base rather than trotting out to the base. I think you show the game and your opponents more respect than that.

When the Layne incident occurred, one of the Bradley dads I was talking to asked if I had a daughter on the team. When I told him No, he said he thought we were a cocky team and that that was a reflection of the coach. While I agreed with him that what Layne was doing was not useful, we certainly have not had anything to be cocky about in recent years. But maybe that attitude got them through the bottom of the seventh in Game Two and will be part of the reason we have a better conference record than expected. We shall see.

We had two fairly nice zones called yesterday, especially in Game One - not so much today.

[flyingMoose]

Has anyone tried ShockerVision for softball? It appears that the camera is manned now (womanned, actually) and is being panned to follow the playing action.