Tarleton Softball set for crucial league showdown with No. 20 Angelo State in Stephenville

Advertisement

THE GAMES
Tarleton will be back home for its second home series of the season this weekend to play host to No. 20 Angelo State in a crucial battle of the Lone Star Conference’s top contenders. The TexAnns will get the series started with a Friday night showdown at 6 p.m. and follow up with a 1 p.m. doubleheader against the Rambelles.

Advertisement

GAME COVERAGE
There will be live stats available for the games, courtesy of the home team. Direct links can be found on the Official Tarleton Sports App, Game Day preview story and Game Day graphics on Tarleton’s Facebook, Twitter and Instagram pages, as well as on the team schedule page at TarletonSports.com. Follow @TarletonSports or @tarletonsball on Twitter for links to coverage. Fans can also have access to all the links for every game by downloading the TarletonSports mobile app for iOS and Android.

SCHUTT SPORTS/NFCA DII PLAYER OF THE YEAR TOP-50 WATCH LIST
The National Fastpitch Coaches Association released its annual Top-50 Watch List for the Schutt Sports/NFCA Division II National Player of the Year Thursday afternoon and Tarleton State University has two players to keep an eye on – Georgia Capell and Tanna Huie. The top 50 list is comprised of returning NFCA All-Americans from last season and a slew of players submitted by head coaches and selected by the NFCA Division II All-America committee. They are the second and third players in Tarleton history to be named to the Top-50 Watch List, joining Katelyn Conlee in 2016.

PRESEASON ALL-AMERICANS
Jordan Withrow and Georgia Capell have been named 2019 Preseason All-Americans by Fastpitch News (FPN). Withrow was named an All-America Second Team pitcher while Capell earned honorable mention honors. Withrow is coming off the best year of her brief Tarleton career as a sophomore in 2018. As a sophomore, Withrow was an honorable mention All-American by FPN and the Lone Star Conference Co-Pitcher of the Year. She also earned all-conference and all-region recognition and was named the LSC Academic Player of the Year. Last spring, she became the first Tarleton pitcher in program history with over 200 strikeouts in a single season (252). Capell made quite the impression as she became the first freshman in program history to be named an All-American. She earned third-team honors from the National Fastpitch Coaches Association (NFCA). In her debut season, Capell was named the South Central Region and Lone Star Conference Freshman of the Year as well as all-conference and all-region.

WITHROW TABBED PRESEASON PITCHER OF THE YEAR
Jordan Withrow was named the LSC Preseason Pitcher of the Year after a sophomore campaign where she was the LSC Pitcher of the Year, an NFCA All-Region Second Team selection and FastpitchNews.com Honorable Mention All-American. Withrow went 26-6 in the circle with 221.1 innings of work and 252 strikeouts, becoming the first player in program history to strikeout 200 in a single season.

MARK’S MILESTONE
Tarleton head coach Mark Cumpian has been an instant success since taking over the Tarleton Softball program. He is currently one victory away from notching career win No. 100 in his young career. He’s on pace to become the second-fastest Tarleton coach (among any sport) in the senior college era to reach 100 career victories. The only coach to reach 100 wins faster was longtime men’s basketball coach Lonn Reisman (133 games).

CHASING THE HOME RUN RECORD
Georgia Capell has established herself as one of the elite power hitters in the country over her young career. The sophomore has already moved into a tie for sixth place on Tarleton’s all-time home run list with hall of famer, Monica Garza (23). With her next home run, she will move into the top five with a tie at No. 5 with Katie Welborn (24).

QUEEN OF Ks
Jordan Withrow has moved into third place in Tarleton history in total strikeouts, becoming the third player in school history to strikeout over 400 batters in a career. She goes into the weekend with 419 career punchouts and is 26 strikeouts away from tying Randi Fentress for the second-most all-time.

LAST TIME OUT
Tarleton took two of three on the road at Western New Mexico. The offense supplied plenty of power in the first two games – tying the school record with five home runs in each of the first two games – and Jordan Withrow threw the sixth no-hitter in program history to lead the TexAnns to a series win against the Mustangs. However, a loss in the series finale dropped Tarleton out of the national rankings for the first time since March 14, 2018.

INSIDE THE SERIES
Tarleton and Angelo State have met on the diamond 60 times since the series began in 2005 and Tarleton has won 19 times. Tarleton is 10-16 all-time against Angelo State in Stephenville. The TexAnns have won six of the last nine meetings since 2016, including winning the regular season series in each of the last two seasons.

UP NEXT FOR TARLETON
Tarleton will head to Weatherford, Oklahoma Wednesday afternoon for a doubleheader and then go to Denton next weekend for a three-game league series at Texas Woman’s. For more information on the Tarleton Softball program, follow @tarletonsball on Twitter.

About debug 971 Articles
Debug user

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.