2017 MVC Softball Tournament

[flyingMoose]

The Tournament is being hosted by Illinois State in Normal and begins on Thursday. The bracket for the Tournament is here.

The first game for the No. 4 Shockers is Friday at 11am when they face the winner of No. 5 Evansville and No. 8 Loyola, a game played on Thursday.

All of the games will be on ESPN3.

[flyingMoose]

Katie is the MVC Pitcher of the Week

[flyingMoose]

Illinois State still has the highest RPI of the Valley teams at 58. I cannot see that being good enough for an at-large bid, so the Valley appears to be a one-bid conference. The RPIs of the other top four seeds are Northern Iowa at 76, Shockers at 77 and Southern Illinois at 88.

Northern Iowa has swept Illinois State and the Shocks (two games) the past two weekends. In early April they took two of three from Southern Illinois, giving the Panthers a 7-1 record against the other top seeds. Again against top seeds, Illinois State are 3-6, Southern Illinois are 5-3 and the Shockers are 1-6.

On the offensive side, Illinois State as a team have an OPS of .970 with 40 homers (de los Reyes has 15), Northern Iowa are .868 with 30 homers, Shockers are .864 with 21 homers and Southern Illinois are .785 with 21 homers. These are the top four OPS in the conference.

In the circle, the Shockers have an ERA of 2.07 with a WHIP of 1.28. Northern Iowa are 2.26 and 1.18, Southern Illinois are 2.66 (fourth in the conference) and 1.30 and Illinois State are 3.32 (sixth) and 1.44.

[1972Shocker]

Six Lady Shockers receive All-MVC Honors. And when I say Lady Shockers I mean Ladies. These Shockers clean up purty good.

:encouragement:

[1972Shocker]

#7 seed Missouri State eliminated #6 seed Drake 2-1 and will play #3 seed SIU tomorrow at 1:30 pm

#8 seed Loyola elimianted #5 seed Evansville 6-1 and will play #4 seed Wichita State tomorrow at 11:00 am. A bit surprised to see Loyola hand Evansville's Morgan Florey. Evansville committed 3 errors behind Florey. Both teams had 6 hits but Evansville made their hits, combined with the 3 Evansville errors, pay bigger dividends. Kiley Jones went the distance for Loyola picking up her 19th win of he season.

http://www.mvc-sports.com/softball/2017softballchampionship/#.WRTrUVUrKM_

Loyola pitching held the Shocks to 6 runs in their 3 game regular season series in Chicago. The Shocks, however, held Loyola to 3 runs but still lost Game 3 by a 1-2 score.

[flyingMoose]

Game One

Loyola 6-1 Evansville

The Ramblers had a three-run homer in the top of the first and added another three runs in the fifth. Kiley Jones threw a six-hitter with fourteen ground ball outs. Morgan Florey took the loss for Evansville.

Loyola plays the Shockers at 11am on Friday. In the conference series between these two teams, the Shocks defeated Jones 3-0 on Saturday and then lost to her 2-1 on Sunday. The Shocker win in the first game Saturday was against Keenan Dolezal. Three runs is the most scored in any one game of the series against the Ramblers. Jenni was still on the mend, so Katie pitched the entire weekend for the Shockers.


Game Two

Missouri State 2-1 Drake

Kelley Holly pitched a no-hitter for the Bears, giving up an unearned run in the second, and completing a higher-seed sweep in the opening day of the Valley Tournament. A two-run triple in the fifth was enough for the win over Drake. Missouri State plays Southern Illinois Friday at 130pm.


EDIT: When I started writing the post, @1972Shocker: had yet to appear. After the supper interruption, I didn't go back to check for later posts. Oh, well.

[1972Shocker]

EDIT: When I started writing the post, @1972Shocker had yet to appear. After the supper interruption, I didn't go back to check for later posts. Oh, well.

Some good additional info and color as always.

[flyingMoose]

Game day article about Madison

[1972Shocker]

Katie Malone in the circle of the Shocks. Kiley Jones, who pitched a complete game yesterday against Evansville is in the circle for Loyola.

Shocks are the home team.

[1972Shocker]

Laurie Derrico drove a 2-2 pitch on a line over the fence just to the right of CF to lead of the 2nd and give the Shocks a 1-0 lead.

[1972Shocker]

Mackenzie Wright struck out looking in both AB's not sure if she is guessing or what. Jones throws a lot of changeups. IMO Shocks need to go up and either sit on the fast ball or sit on the changeup and hack away when the get what they are looking for until they get 2 strikes then the just need to shorten up their swings and try to put the ball in play.

Laurie's home run on a two strike ptich was a short quick stroke.

[1972Shocker]

After Mckenzie Adams reached on a 1-out error by the Loyola in the 3rd Madison Perrigan line a home to dead center on the 1st pitch she saw and the Shocks lead
is expanded to 3-0.

Both Madison's home rund an Laurie's home run were hit pretty much line drives that had just enough elevation to clear the 6-foot fence but boht were hit very hard.

[1972Shocker]

Katie gave up 3 pretty well hit balls in the 4th but retired all 3 batters. The final out of the inning was caught at the warning track in left center. I mentione it because I like on outfiled with a warning track. Has to help the outfielders.

Keenan Dolezal comes in to pitch for Loyola in the bottom of the 4th.

[1972Shocker]

I've lost the ESPN3 video stream.

Katie gives up a home run to Loyola's catcher, Katie Kasubke, to lead of the 5th and make it a 3-1 ball game. Kasubke had the 3-run homer in the 1st inning of Loyola's win over Evansville yesterday.

Katie quickly got back on track and retired the next 3 Loyola hitters in order. The home run was Loyola's first hit and first baserunner of the game.

Got the ESPN3 stream back.

[xazshox]

Shox RISP now 0.000 based on wasting 0 of 5 opportunities.