Pirates Travel To League-Leading UCF
April 01, 2010 | Softball
April 1, 2010
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GREENVILLE, N.C. - After a Tuesday sweep of UNC Greensboro, the East Carolina softball team, winner of nine of the past 10 games, travels to Orlando for a pivotal series at UCF (22-13, 7-1 C-USA). Friday, the teams play a doubleheader starting at 3:00 p.m. The Saturday finale is set to begin at 12:00 p.m. The Knights enter this weekend in first place in the league standings while the Pirates are tied for second.
Pirates Against The Knights ...
The teams have a brief history as the series began in 2006 when UCF joined C-USA. East Carolina owns a 12-2 advantage, but the Knights’ two victories, May 11, 2007, during the league tournament and March 9, 2008, have come in Orlando.
Last season in Greenville, ECU won the three contests as its pitching staff did not allow a run all weekend in 3-0, 3-0 and 5-0 victories. Toni Paisley and Brooke Swann combined to allow eight hits and strike out 15 in the three games. In the opener, Jessica Johnson’s two-out, two-run single in the fifth inning provided the winning run. The second contest had ECU scoring all three of its runs on wild pitches thrown in the sixth inning by UCF’s Ashleigh Cole. In the Sunday finale, Angel Barrella, Marina Gusman-Brown, Sissy Jimenez, Johnson and Paisley each drove in a run while Christina Merrida had two hits.
Seven And Counting ...
Paisley has won her past six starts and seven decisions as she has allowed only five earned runs over the 45.0 innings pitched, good for a 0.78 earned run average. She has also struck out 67 batters during the span.
Tom Finds Her Swing ...
Senior shortstop Kaui Tom had been struggling at the plate entering last week, batting .135 with seven hits and three runs batted in. During the past seven contests, she has turned it around, batting .364 with eight hits, a team-best 11 runs batted in and a .727 slugging percentage. During Sunday’s series finale against Marshall, she drove in a career-high four runs with a double and three-run home run.
Sumner Moving Up The Leader Boards ...
Senior Charina Sumner hit her 17th career triple Tuesday in game two at UNC Greensboro. She is now in sole possession of fourth on the East Carolina all-time list and in third in Conference USA history. The Pirates will face the league’s all-time leader this weekend in UCF shortstop Tiffany Lane, who has 21.
Sumner is also eighth in career hits at ECU with 204 and, after Tuesday, tied with Eva Herron (1999-02) for seventh in runs scored with 126.
Four-Of-Seven And Three-Of-Five ...
During Tuesday’s doubleheader at UNC Greensboro, the Pirates recorded four home runs. The long balls were hit by four of the team’s seven seniors as Sumner, Tom, Vanessa Moreno and Gusman-Brown all went deep. Sumner, Tom and Gusman- Brown are also three of ECU’s five players from Hawai’i.
Starting Strong ...
Of the 57 runs the Pirates have scored during the past seven games, 38 have come in the first three innings. ECU has scored 11 times in the first, five in the second and 22 in the third.
Finding The Home-Run Swing ...
Also over the past seven games, East Carolina has found its home-run power, hitting 10. Gusman-Brown leads the way with four over that span while Tom has hit two.
The team’s homer numbers are also improved over last season’s totals. Through the first 29 games of the 2009 season, ECU had hit just eight home runs. The Pirates have 15 through 29 contests this year.
More On The Power Stroke ...
The Pirates have hit two home runs in the past three games and in four of the past five contests. All of last season, ECU managed to hit two long balls in just four games.
In fact, East Carolina had not hit multiple home runs in threestraight games since May 5-6, 2007, in a Conference USA series at Southern Miss. The Pirates hit two balls over the wall in each of the three games.
