Notebook: Red Devils Open SLIAC Schedule Wednesday

EUREKA, Ill. -- The Eureka College softball team will begin the 18-game St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference schedule this week when the Red Devils visit Blackburn Wednesday for a 3 p.m. doubleheader before hosting Webster in a noon twin bill Saturday.

 

The Red Devils are scheduled to play four times at home this weekend. Rose-Hulman of the Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference will visit Sunday for a noon doubleheader after the Red Devils and Fightin' Engineers were rained out on March 17.

 

 

Eureka split its only doubleheader of the week, besting USCAA Robert Morris-Springfield 5-0 in game one and falling 2-1 in the nightcap.

 

Erin Smith struck out five in the opener, walked only one and limited the hosts to only three hits. Kali George went 2-for-4 with a double and three RBI while Gabby Wood and Allison Cagley also drove in runs in the win. Krysten Wallace walked three times en route to extending her all-time Eureka record for bases on balls to 64.

 

Eureka was limited to four hits in game two. Only Wallace's first-inning double went for extra bases. George struck out four in the circle and allowed only one earned run.

 

For the second time in her 23-outing career, sophomore right-hander Erin Smith has been selected St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Pitcher of the Week, the league announced Monday.

 

With a 3-0 record, she has allowed one run on 16 hits in 26.0 innings of action this spring. The win was the 12th of her career and lowered her career ERA to 2.41 over 116.1 innings, currently sixth-lowest in program history among pitchers with at least 100 innings.

 

AT BLACKBURN (Wednesday DH, 3 p.m.)

Eureka will begin its 12th SLIAC schedule Wednesday when the Red Devils make the 130-mile trip to Carlinville, Ill. for a 3 p.m. twin bill with Blackburn. The Beavers are 9-6 this season, but have three of their last five contests since an 11-4 loss to Crown on March 13 in Fort Myers, Fla.

 

Blackburn slashes .326/.381/.492 as a team. Senior Hannah Goett is on a tear at the plate for the Beavers, sharing the national lead with seven home runs in her first 54 plate appearances. BC has clubbed 15 home runs as a team and its average of 1.0 long ball per game ranks 11th in Division III.

 

The BC pitching staff has a 4.21 ERA through 98.0 innings. Brooke Daniels has owns a 3.03 ERA through a team-high 37.0 innings while Halle Fransen and Jensen Ballinger have won four games apiece in the circle.

 

Kerry Crum, a 1975 graduate of Illinois, owns a 24-51 record in his third season as head coach at Blackburn. The Beavers went 13-17 overall last season and 5-13 in league action for an eighth-place finish. BC was picked eighth in the 2018 SLIAC coaches' poll.

 

Eureka swept the Beavers last season, winning both games via the eight-run rule. The Red Devils own a 25-15 record against BC over their last 40 meetings since 1996, including a 10-8 mark in Carlinville and a 14-8 record since becoming SLIAC opponents in 2007.

 

VS. WEBSTER (Saturday DH, Noon)

Eureka will take its second attempt to begin the home portion of its schedule on Saturday when SLIAC foe Webster comes to town for a noon doubleheader.

 

The Gorloks are 5-7 this spring, playing the bulk of their contests during a week-long trip to Kissimmee, Fla. WU's biggest win of the campaign was a 5-0 blanking of then-#15 Washington (Mo.) on March 4. Webster will open the SLIAC schedule Wednesday at Greenville before Saturday's bout with EC.

 

Through 12 games, Webster hits .275/.369/.376 as a team in 396 combined plate appearances. Senior infielder Katlyn Garza leads WU with a .417 average and shares the team lead with nine RBI. Three WU hurlers have combined for a 2.98 team ERA, led by Kaitlyn Johnson's mark of 2.51 over 22.1 innings. The Gorloks strike out only 2.3 batters per seven innings.

 

The 2018 season marks Chris Eaton's 10th as head coach at Webster. The 2010 SLIAC Coach of the Year owns a 186-168 record in St. Louis and guided the Gorloks to back-to-back league titles in 2009 and 2010. Webster went 28-16 overall a year ago and 13-5 in the league before advancing to the championship game of the 2017 SLIAC Tournament. WU was voted third in the 2018 SLIAC coaches' poll.

 

Webster won both games of last season's doubleheader with the Red Devils in suburban St. Louis and has won 25 of 27 games against EC since 1999, including a 10-0 victory in the 2002 NCAA Tournament. The Red Devils' most recent win in the series was a 5-4 victory in Eureka on April 29, 2016.

 

VS. ROSE-HULMAN (Sunday DH, Noon)

After rainfall and subsequent wet field conditions forced a postponement on March 17, Rose-Hulman will travel to Eureka Sunday for a noon doubleheader against the Red Devils. Through 12 games, the FIghtin' Engineers are 5-7. RHIT has played 10 of its games 12 during a spring-break trip to Clermont, Fla. from Feb. 25 through March 2 and lost both games of a doubleheader to SLIAC member Spalding on March 18 in Terre Haute.

 

The Fightin' Engineers hit .300 as a team, led by a 400/.467/.525 slash line from junior infielder Mandi Routon. Five different players have made at least 41 plate appearances, all of which are hitting at least .306. Senior Michelle Korf owns a 2.71 ERA in 31.0 innings to pace a RHIT staff with a team ERA of 3.49.

 

Longtime RHIT head coach Brian Shearer is in his 16th season. The Indiana State graduate has won 225 games in Terre Haute and led the Fightin' Engineers to conference championships in 2005 and 2008. Rose-Hulman, which went 11-25 overall and 1-13 in Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference action last spring, was picked last in the nine-team league in a preseason coaches' poll.

 

Eureka has never played Rose-Hulman in softball. The Red Devils have never played any of the nine teams in the Greenwood, Ind.-based HCAC. The Rose-Hulman Institution of Technology was founded in 1874 in Terre Haute, Ind. The undergraduate enrollment is approximately 2,200.