Softball To Wrap-Up Early Season Tournaments at Evansville

Saturday, March 9

Evansville, Ind.

12:30 p.m.

Murray State

Bowling Green

Photo by: Murray State Sports Information

Softball To Wrap-Up Early Season Tournaments at Evansville

3/8/2013 4:01:00 PM | Softball

Game Notes

MSU 2013 Record: 5-8 (0-0 OVC)

This Weekend's Opponents:
Bowling Green: 5-4 (0-0 MAC)
All-Time vs. BGSU: 0-1
Evansville: 1-8 (0-0 MVC)
All-Time vs. UE: 2-3

The Murray State softball team will travel to Evansville, Ind., this weekend to play in its fourth and final early-season tournament. While at Evansville, the Racers will play two games against Bowling Green and two against the host Purple Ace.

The Racers went 1-3 at last weekend's Magic City Classic, with one game canceled due to weather. Murray State dropped its first two games of the weekend to South Alabama by just a combined three runs.

The Jaguars bested MSU, 1-0, in the first game on Friday, then again by a score of 8-6 on Saturday. In the second game versus USA, the Racers scored all six runs in the third inning with home runs from Ellyn Troup and Alexa Becker and a pair of RBI singles from Shelbey Miller and Mo Ramsey. However, the Jaguars bounced back with a five-run fifth to take the win.

The Racers split the final day of play by topping Nicholls State, 3-2, before falling to hosts UAB, 2-0, in the finale. In the win over Nicholls, Troup tallied the game-winning RBI in the third when she singled through the left side and drove in Casey Castile, in the process.

Following Sunday's games, Mo Ramsey was named to the Magic City Classic All-Tournament Team. On the weekend, she turned in a .357 average with four hits, two RBIS, one run and went a perfect 4-for-4 on the base paths.

The Racers and the Falcons have tangled on just one previous occasion with Bowling Green coming out on top. The two teams met at last year's Hilltopper Spring Classic in Bowling Green, Ky., where BGSU came away with the 6-4 win.

The Falcons are currently 5-4 on the season, but have had some bad luck when it comes to weather, losing nine games so far this season to Mother Nature. After having six of its previous eight scheduled games canceled, BGSU finally found the field on Wednesday when it traveled to Western Kentucky.

The Falcons fell in game one to the Hilltoppers, 3-1, but bounced back with an8-6 win in the night cap. Erika Stratton led the offensive barrage in game two by going 2-for-2 with a run, a double, a home run, and an RBI.

Stratton is the current Falcon offensive leader with a .353 average, six RBIs, a .588 slugging percentage and a .560 on-base percentage. Paris Imholz currently leads the BGSU pitching staff with a 1.37 ERA, a 4-1 record and 17 strikeouts.

There have been five previous meetings between the two teams, but this weekend will mark the first since 2011. The Purple Aces currently lead the series, 3-2.

The two teams split a pair of games in Murray in 2010 and split again in Evansville in 2011. The deciding game came in the form of a 4-3 Evansville win 2011 at Lipscomb's Lady Bison Classic in Nashville.

The Purple Aces are currently 1-8 on the season and have lost three of their last four games. The last action for Evansville came in the Jackson State Tournament at the end of February where they went 1-3. The Purple Aces lost three games to Nebraska Omaha, but topped the host Tigers, 5-0.

Kayla Fortner currently leads the team with a .333 batting average, while Kendall Kautz sports a team-high nine RBIs. At 0-0 on the year, Taylor Perry has the team's lowest ERA at .341 to go along with 13 strikeouts.

Live stats will be available for all games this weekend and can be found at GoRacers.com. For live in-game updates on Twitter, fans can follow @MSURacers or @PGriffithMSU.