SLC’s top two teams face off, Cowgirls, Demons in telling series
Published 10:51 am Thursday, April 14, 2022
- Shaelyn Sanders leads the McNeese State pitching staff with a 6-1 record and 1.99 ERA. (Kirk Meche / Special to the American Press)
The stakes and talent level will be high this weekend when the McNeese State Cowgirls travel to face Northwestern State in a key Southland Conference softball series.
The first game is at 6 p.m. today. The series concludes with a doubleheader beginning at 1 p.m. Friday.
McNeese (24-15, 8-1 SLC) leads the conference standings. The Demons (24-15, 6-3) are in second place, two games back. McNeese enters having won 12 of its last 13 games. Northwestern enters on a 12-4 run, though the Demons lost two of three last weekend at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi.
The Cowgirls have the reigning conference hitter of the week in Jil Poullard, while the Demons feature the pitcher of the week in Sage Hoover (9-4, 2.23 ERA), who has won three of her four past starts, including a 12-inning, 18-strikeout game against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi.
The Demons staff also features Maggie Darr (8-3, 2.03) and Bronte Rhoden (4-3, 2.02).
The Demons lead the conference in ERA (2.40), strikeouts (312) and opponents batting average (.212).
“They have pitched really well and played good defense,” McNeese head coach James Landreneau said of the Demons. “They have been able to keep opponents from scoring run and haven’t kicked the ball around on defense.”
The Cowgirls counter in the circle with Shaelyn Sanders (6-1, 1.99), Ashley Vallejo (9-6, 2.63) and Whitney Tate (7-7, 3.55).
McNeese ranks second in runs scored (202) and third in batting average (.267).
“We have played clean defensively, pitched pretty well and have started to show more aggressiveness at the plate,” Landreneau said. “We have been able to put good at-bats together through the order and put pressure on the opponent.”
Landreneau said he isn’t worried about the standings.
“We try to keep it one game at a time,” he said. “The only thing we can control is our performance in the next game. If you start looking at standings and stuff like that, it brings in outside noise and can become a distraction.”
Poullard leads McNeese in batting average (.389), home runs (6) and runs batted in (32). In conference play, she is hitting .478 with a home run, four doubles, two triples and 12 RBIs.
Outfielder Kendall Talley (.354) is hitting .542 in conference play.
