Ohio Softball Set for 2020 Courtyard Marriott Barefoot Landing Invitational

2/27/2020 12:00:00 AM | Softball

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ATHENS, Ohio – The Ohio softball team will travel to Conway, S.C. Feb. 28-Mar. 1 when they compete in the 2020 Courtyard Marriott Barefoot Landing Invitational hosted by Coastal Carolina. While there, the Bobcats will take on Maryland Eastern Shore and Costal Carolina on Friday, Monmouth and Coastal on Saturday and conclude the weekend with USC Upstate on Sunday morning.

SCOUTING COASTAL CAROLINA
Coastal Carolina currently sits at a 9-3 record to begin the 2020 season. They are coming off a 4-game win streak, beating Seaton Hall, Iona, and UMBC at the 2020 Ripley Chanticleer Showdown in Conway, South Carolina.

Coastal Carolina's 2019 season ended with an overall record of 39-21 with a .650 win-percentage. Their season came to a close with a loss to Louisiana 0-1 at the Sun Belt Tournament in San Marcos, Texas. The Chanticleers ended the season with a conference record of 13-14.

Chanticleers Makiya Thomas leads the team in hitting with a .571 batting average and is tied for the most hits on the 2020 season with Peyton Rivas at 16 hits each. However, Abbey Montoya has the highest slug percentage at .731 coming into the Courtyard Marriott Barefoot Landing Invitational.

New to the circle for Coastal Carolina is freshman Raelee Brabham who has a record of 5 wins on the 2020 season so far. She currently holds a 0.46 ERA and leads the team with 33 recorded strikeouts. The Chanticleers have an overall ERA of 2.04 for the 2020 season.

SCOUTING MARYLAND EASTERN SHORE
Maryland Eastern Shore is currently 1-8 for the 2020 season after their efforts at the Spartan Classic. At the tournament, the Hawks defeated the University of Buffalo, and were defeated by the University of Massachusetts, USC Upstate, and Oakland University.

MESU finished the 2019 season with a record of 8-31, and finished 3-11 within conference play. The team finished the 2019 season with 206 hits including, 46 doubles and 6 home runs on the season.

Hawks outfielder Kaylyn Sterling leads the team with the highest batting average at .333 as well as the largest slugging percentage at .524. Sterling has 7 hits and 4 doubles on the season and she also leads the team in RBI's.

Returning to the mound for Maryland Eastern Shore is Junior Nasya Goodman. Goodman contributed to 5 wins last year for the hawks and had an ERA of 6.27 in the 2019 season. She also recorded 83 strikeouts of the teams combined 93 strikeouts in the previous season.

SCOUTING MONMOUTH
Monmouth will enter the matchup with Ohio with a record of 5-5, winning three of four games in the last tournament they competed in, Georgia Southern's Eagle Round Robin. After a three-game losing streak, the Hawks defeated Furman 6-1 at the Eagle Round Robin. Later in the weekend Monmouth also claimed victories over Maryland and Evansville.

Last season Monmouth finished with a 36-18, winning their second straight MAAC Championship. Their conference title allowed them to make an appearance in the NCAA Regionals, where the Hawks fell to LSU. Monmouth played Louisiana Tech in the elimination game, concluding their time at the NCAA Tournament.

Leading the Hawks in hitting is senior Kayla Rosado with a .457 batting average. In 35 at bats, Rosado has seven runs, four doubles, two homeruns, and 11 RBIs. Rosado is followed by Amanda Hopeck who has .375 batting average, four runs, one double, and four RBIs.

In the circle for the Hawks is junior pitcher Alyssa Irons. Irons has appeared in seven games, starting six of them. In her 45 innings of play, she has accumulated 39 strikeouts and a 2.18 ERA.

SCOUTING USC UPSTATE
USC Upstate enters the tournament on a four-game winning streak and has 12-2 record. The Spartans swept the Wings ETC Classic last weekend, with wins over Maine, La Salle, Virginia, and Tennessee Tech. Last season Upstate finished with a 40-16 overall record.

Freshman Tiffany Domingue leads the Spartans with a .409 batting average In 44 at bats, Domingue has had eight runs, five doubles, two homeruns and 13 RBI's. Sophomore Savannah Grigsby and freshman Max Barnes follow with 11 RBI each.

Senior Erin Hill is among the returners for USC Upstate. This season on the mound, Hill has made 10 appearances and has started five games, pitching 41 innings. Hill has a 1.54 ERA and has recorded 36 strikeouts.

Prior to head coach Kenzie Roark's time at Ohio, she served as USP Upstate's pitching coach for four years. In her time with the Spartans, Roark helped coach a team to three NCAA Tournament appearances (2015, '16 and '17). USC Upstate won the Atlantic Sun Conference Regular Season Championship in 2015 and 2017, and won the ASUN Tournament Championship in 2015, '16 and '17. The Spartans also complied three 40-win seasons during her time there, including a 45-13 record in 2017. The USC Upstate staff had the ASUN's top ERA in three-straight seasons from 2015-17. In 2017, the Spartans' pitching staff ranked sixth nationally with a 1.42 ERA, and in 2015, the staff was ranked 25^th nationally, with a 2.46 ERA.

LAST WEEK AT CHARLESTON INVITATIONAL
The Bobcats finished up their weekend at the Chattanooga Challenge 3-2 overall. The Ohio softball team (5-10) started off the weekend strong by securing a win over Army in their first game of the tournament. Ohio got an early led, scoring two in the first inning, putting the score at 2-0 until the bottom of the third when Army scored three runs. The Bobcats scored three of their own in the top of the fourth, allowing them to lead 5-3 over Army. Army was able so score one more run during the game, but Ohio recorded three more runs in the top of the seventh, defeating Army 8-4.

The Bobcats kept that momentum going into the second game of the afternoon against N.C. Central. The Eagles scored two in the top of the first giving them an early lead, but Ohio matched N.C. Central in runs and tied up the score 2-2 going into the second inning. After no runs in the second inning, N.C. Central recorded four more in the third, giving them a 6-2 lead until the bottom of the sixth. The Bobcats began their comeback in the bottom of the sixth, scoring two runs, then in the seventh when Ohio kept the Eagles from scoring. The Bobcats scored the three needed runs to take a 7-6 lead, allowing Ohio to sweep day one.

After falling to Dartmouth earlier on Saturday (Feb. 22), the Bobcats redeemed themselves later in the afternoon again Charleston Southern. Scoring two in the top of the first, Ohio kept the lead the entire game. Ohio brought in three more runner over the course of the fourth, fifth, and sixth innings, defeating Charleston Southern 8-2. On the last day of play, Ohio was only able to score one run, giving Appalachian State the 9-1 victory.

SCOUTING OHIO
The Bobcats are 5-10 overall after competing in the Charleston Invitational.

Offensively, the Bobcats are hitting .302 as a team, scoring a total of 64 runs with 133 hits, 24 doubles, and four homeruns. They've also registered 58 RBI and have a team slugging percentage of .415. The Bobcats also have a .361 on base percentage, while drawing 38 walks.

Leading the way in hitting is junior Allie Englant (Long Beach, Calif.) who is hitting .469 with 23 hits, two double, fifteen runs scored and three RBIs. Junior Katie Yun (North Canton, Ohio) follows, hitting .393 with 22 hits, six doubles, two homerun, ten runs scored and 12 RBI. She also has an .607 slugging percentage.

2019 BOBCAT REWIND
Ohio finished the 2019 season 34-21, 12-8 in-conference, just shy of winning back-to-back Mid-American Conference titles after falling to Toledo (29-26) in the final round. Thanks to a grand slam in the seventh inning that increased the lead to 7-2, Ohio was able to defeat the top-seeded Miami (35-14), giving the Bobcats another shot at claiming the regular season crown. Despite a 5-0 lead in the first game against Toledo, Ohio was unable to recover from three errors late in the first game and five errors in game two.

Overall, the team finished with a collective on-base percentage of .365, a .462 slugging percentage and a .295 batting average. The Bobcats scored 299 runs, had 269 RBIs, hit 64 doubles and 68 homeruns, stole 52 bases and had 4 shutouts.

RETURNERS
This season, the returners for Ohio consist of five sophomores, five juniors, and one senior. Last season, senior outfielder Alexa Holland (Rochester, Ind.) had a fielding percentage of .958, with 37 outputs and nine assists. Holland finished the 2019 season with the highest batting average of her career, .266. With 29 hits in 109 at bats, she scored 18 runs, hit one triple and registered six RBI. Last Season, Holland was named to the Academic All-MAC team for the second time.

Junior Katie Yun (North Canton, Ohio) also returns for the Bobcats. Last season, Yun was batting a team high of .394 with a .711 slugging percentage, 14 homeruns and 18 doubles. Registering 78 hits, Yun set the single season hits record. Yun earned First Team All-MAC, 2019 Google Cloud Academic All-District Team, and All-Mideast Region First Team.

In the circle, junior Madi McCrady (Brimfield, Ohio) is back in the Green and White after posting a 23-13 record and a 3.20 ERA in 229.1 innings pitched, while striking out 207. McCrady also earned a spot on the Academic All-MAC squad.

Other returners include sophomores Caroline Spacek, Justice Ruggles and Mackensie Kohl as well as juniors Allie Englant and Brooke Rice.

NEW TO THE SQUAD
Ohio is welcoming 10 newcomers to the team, seven freshmen and three transfers.

Incoming freshmen for this season include, Alexis Dawe, Kaci Branch, Sydney Larson, Molly Troutman, Ryan Shaughnessy, Sophia Bernard and Holly Brehm.

The Bobcats also added three transfers to the roster for the 2020 season, including junior Ava Heidorn (Marysville, Ohio) who comes to Ohio after spending two seasons at UL-Monroe. Ohio also sees redshirt sophomore pitcher Baylie Thornhill (Baton Rouge, La.) come to Ohio from LSU, and sophomore infielder Caitlin Fogue (Columbia, Mo.) puts on the Green and White after one season at Missouri.

PRESEASON POLL
Ohio softball team has been selected fourth in the 2020 MAC Softball Preseason Poll, the league announced today (Feb. 5). The poll was voted on by the head coaches of the 11 MAC institutions.

The Bobcats earned 86 votes, but did not receive a first-place vote. Finishing ahead of Ohio is Miami who was selected as this year's favorite with 113 votes and four first place votes, followed by Kent State with 112 votes and four first place votes. Ball State finished with 90 votes and two first place votes.

Selected behind Ohio is Toledo (68) with one first place vote, Central Michigan (66), Northern Illinois (65), Western Michigan (48), Bowling Green (32), Akron (25) and Buffalo (21).

Miami and Kent State both were selected to take home the 2020 MAC Tournament crown, earning five votes each. Ball State also received one vote to win the tournament.

COMING UP
Up next, the Bobcats head to Maderia Beach, Fla. March 7-8 for THE Spring Games where they will take on St. Bonaventure, Iowa, South Dakota State and Merrimack.

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