Bowling Green State University Athletics
Falcons Face Kent State, NIU This Week
April 20, 2004 | Softball
April 20, 2004
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BOWLING GREEN, Ohio - The Bowling Green State University softball team, after winning six of last week's seven games, has another busy week on tap, with five Mid-American Conference games ... the Falcons of sixth-year head coach Leigh Ross-Shaw will travel to Northeast Ohio for a Wednesday (April 21) doubleheader vs. Kent State University ... first pitch is scheduled for 2:00 p.m. at the Kent State Softball Field.
Following the KSU twinbill, the Falcons will return home for a three-game weekend series against Northern Illinois University ... the Falcons and Huskies will play a Saturday (April 24) doubleheader and a Sunday (April 25) single game, with the first pitch set for 1:00 p.m. each day at the BGSU Softball Field.
BGSU, currently riding a four-game winning streak, is 21-21 on the season, and the Falcons are 8-5 in MAC play ... the Falcons are coming off a 2003 season that saw the team go 26-26-1 overall and 15-9 in the conference ... BG finished fourth in the West Division and fifth overall, advancing to the MAC Tournament for the fifth time in six seasons.
ROSS-SHAW SETS ANOTHER RECORD
Falcon head coach Leigh Ross-Shaw, already the winningest coach in BGSU softball history, has reached another milestone ... with the Falcons' first win of the Ball State series, Ross-Shaw set a new school record for wins in MAC games ... she moved past Jacquie Joseph (now the head coach at Michigan State) on that list ... Ross-Shaw is now 81-50 in MAC play ... Joseph had a 78-71 league mark while at BG ... Ross-Shaw had passed Joseph on the overall wins chart last May, and now has a mark of 158-136-2 in her sixth season (complete lists on page 11 of the pdf version of this release).
HEIMRICH HAS A WEEK (AND A STREAK)
BGSU sophomore Lindsay Heimrich is likely the first player in school history to throw a no-hitter and hit an inside-the-park homerun in the same week ... Heimrich threw her first collegiate no-no last Monday (April 12) vs. Oakland ... she hit the homer vs. Ball State Saturday (April 17) ... Heimrich had at least one hit in each game last week, extending her current hitting streak to a career-high 12 games ... in that time, she is hitting .442 (19-of-43) with seven runs scored and 10 RBI ... she has raised her seasonal batting average 63 points, from .250 to .313, in those 12 games.
IT STARTS WITH PITCHING
The Falcon pitching staff had one solid outing after another last week ... sophomore Liz Vrabel went 3-1 with an ERA of just 0.70, and picked up all three wins in the Falcons' sweep of Ball State ... senior Jody Johnson threw a one-hitter in a midweek shutout win at Buffalo ... and, sophomore Lindsay Heimrich, on the same day she was named the MAC Player of the Week for her hitting exploits the previous week, threw a no-hitter vs. Oakland ... in all, the Falcons had a team ERA of just 0.76 last week, and the team's ERA is 1.50 on the season.
HEAD COACH LEIGH ROSS-SHAW
Leigh Ross-Shaw is in her sixth season as a collegiate head coach, all with the Falcons, and has an overall record of 158-136-2 (.537) ... BGSU's final win in 2003, vs. Northern Illinois in the MAC Tournament, made Ross-Shaw the winningest coach in school history ... Ross-Shaw, the 2001 MAC Coach of the Year, is also the school's leader in MAC victories and league winning percentage ... she has a league mark of 81-50 (.618) ... in all games, Ross-Shaw currently ranks second in winning pct., trailing only Sandy Haines (.557; 57-45-3 from 1981-83).
Ross-Shaw, the 2001 MAC Coach of the Year, guided the Brown and Orange to a MAC East Division title that spring after a co-championship in 2000 ... she was the fastest coach in BG annals to get to 100 overall wins as well as 50 MAC victories ... and, of course, she sets new school marks in both categories with each victory.
Ross-Shaw assumed the top job after two years as BG's assistant coach ... the Ottawa Lake, Mich., native came to the Falcon program in August of 1996 after serving as a high-school head coach, at Notre Dame Academy in Toledo, for four seasons ... Ross-Shaw is the only coach in school history to string together three consecutive winning seasons in MAC play ... the Falcons, who also had a winning league ledger in Ross-Shaw's last year as an assistant (1998), posted four-straight winning MAC marks from 1998-2001.
Ross-Shaw, a 1992 graduate of the University of Toledo, still holds numerous UT and MAC records, and remains the all-time league leader in batting average (.398), at-bats and hits ... she hit a MAC-record .447 as a senior en route to All-America Second-Team honors ... in February of 2001, she was inducted into the UT Athletics Hall of Fame.
ASSISTANT COACHES
Kyle Jamieson is in his first season as a member of Ross-Shaw's staff, serving as an instructor/softball assistant ... a native of Stittsville, Ontario, Jamieson has an extensive playing and coaching background, including a coaching stint with the Danish Men's National Team ... he also has MAC ties, having spent the 2000 season on the staff at Toledo ... Steve Babinski is in his second campaign on Ross-Shaw's staff ... Babinski, a graduate of Grace (Ind.) College, was a standout baseball player there ... he spent several years coaching at the Bowling Green Christian Academy ... Crystal Wilson is in her first season on the coaching staff, after completing a stellar four-year playing career in the Brown and Orange last spring ... originally a walk-on, the Toledo Whitmer product wound up as the Falcons' starting leftfielder as a junior and senior ... she hit grand slams in back-to-back home games last April.
THIS WEEK'S OPPONENTS
Kent State begins the week with an overall record of 17-15 ... the Golden Flashes will take a league record of 8-3 into Wednesday's twinbill vs. the Falcons ... last week, KSU dropped a Thursday (April 15) DH to Central Michigan before sweeping Akron in a weekend series (the final game was at Firestone Stadium in Akron) ... at the plate, senior SS Marci Ridenbaugh is hitting .321, while junior 3B Jodi Stevens, the reigning MAC East Division Player of the Week, is hitting .316 with a team-high .595 slugging pct. ... Stevens leads the team with four triples and is tied with senior C Carrie Eneix with four homers ... freshman Brittany Robinson leads a balanced pitching staff with a 1.41 ERA ... Robinson is 6-6 on the year ... senior Tracie Logar is 4-3 with a 1.65 ERA, while classmate Kate Leary is 7-6 with a 1.69 ERA ... last season, KSU finished 27-19 overall and 14-10 in MAC action ... head coach Karen Linder has a record of 205-184 in her ninth year with the Flashes ... she is 438-394-1 in her 19th season overall ... the school's athletics web site is www.kentstatesports.com.
Northern Illinois is 10-32 on the season to date, and the Huskies will take a 2-10 MAC record into a Wednesday (April 21) home doubleheader vs. Ball State ... NIU is looking to stop a 14-game losing streak ... four of those setbacks have come in extra innings ... last weekend, Northern fell in a three-game series at CMU ... individually, sophomore Kelly Drozd was hitting a team-high .258, heading into the final game at Central, while senior Kelly Redican was batting .234 ... sophomore Paige Granath was 1-7 in the circle, with a 3.02 ERA ... junior Kathy Dearborn was 3-14 with a 3.27 ERA, while senior Amy Krahula was 5-10 with a 3.65 ERA ... last season's Huskie squad went 23-21-1 overall and 13-7-1 in the league ... head coach Donna Martin has a record of 277-244-10 in her 10th year, all with the Huskies ... the school's athletics web site is www.niuhuskies.com.
BRIEF SERIES NOTES
The Falcons trail the all-time series with Kent State by a 43-37-1 margin, and the Flashes have won the last three meetings ... KSU swept a three-game series in Kent early in the 2002 season (March 29-30, 2002) ... prior to those '02 games, the Falcons had won five of the previous six meetings in the series.
BGSU trails Northern Illinois, 11-8, in that series, and the Huskies swept all three regular-season meetings in DeKalb last season (April 26-27, 2003) ... but, BGSU picked up a 7-2 victory over the Huskies in the MAC Tournament in Akron two weeks later (May 8, 2003) ... Northern has not ventured to BG in over four years, since the Huskies swept a doubleheader (9-5 and 7-5) on April Fool's Day of 2000 ... last year's MAC Tourney win snapped a four-game BGSU losing streak to the Huskies.
RECENTLY...
The Falcons went 6-1 last week ... the Falcons swept Oakland in a Monday (April 12) doubleheader, 2-0 on a Lindsay Heimrich no-hitter, and 10-2 in five innings ... BGSU split at Buffalo on Thursday (April 15), losing the opener by a 1-0 count, before picking up a 4-0 win on a Jody Johnson one-hitter ... then, the Falcons returned home and swept a three-game series from Ball State, by scores of 3-2, 6-2 and 4-2 ... Liz Vrabel got all three wins in the circle vs. the Cards, with two coming in relief.
ANDERSON COMES THROUGH IN THE CLUTCH
For the second consecutive weekend, junior Kristen Anderson came through with a game-ending hit ... on Saturday (April 17), with the Falcons trailing Ball State by a 2-1 count in the bottom of the seventh, Anderson came to the plate with the bases loaded, after the Cardinals had issued an intentional walk to sophomore Gina Rango ... Anderson hit the first pitch she saw, singling up the middle to plate the tying and winning runs ... Anderson had singled in the bottom of the 12th to drive home the game's only run in a win over Western Michigan the previous weekend ... on the season, she is hitting .246 with 25 runs batted in ... her RBI total places her second on the team.
BACA GETS ON BASE
Falcon freshman Jeanine Baca has hit well for most of the season, but has stepped it up over the past few weeks ... last week, she hit .435 as the Falcons won six of seven games ... in MAC play last week, the centerfielder hit a team-high .529, going 9-for-17 at the plate, with a pair of doubles and a triple ... she had a .765 slugging percentage and a .529 on-base pct. in league games on the week, and had three-hit games in both ends of Saturday's doubleheader sweep of Ball State ... Baca now has seven three-hit games this year, more than half of the team's total (12) ... she is hitting .429 over her last 20 games, to up her average to .328 on the season ... Baca leads the Falcons with a .413 batting average in MAC games.
NOTING THE FALCONS
The Falcons have a 21-21 record, and BGSU is now 8-5 in MAC play ... BG is 7-3 at home, 5-10 in road games and 9-8 in neutral-site contests ... the Falcons are batting .249 to the opponents' .211 ... sophomore 3B Gina Rango leads the team with a .336 batting average, and also paces the Brown and Orange in at-bats (140), hits (47), doubles (11), homers (six), runs batted in (29), slugging pct. (.557) and total bases (78) ... Rango is the lone Falcon to have started all 42 games to date, while junior RF Kristen Anderson, freshman CF Jeanine Baca and sophomore 1B/P Lindsay Heimrich each have made 41 starts ... Baca is second on the team with a .328 batting average, while Heimrich is hitting .313 ... Baca is tied with Rango for the team lead with 22 runs scored, and is second with 45 hits ... Heimrich has 19 runs, while freshman 2B Megan McPherson has 14 ... Anderson has four homers and 25 RBI, ranking second on the team in each category ... Baca has raised her batting average by 28 points in the last five games ... Heimrich, who has upped her batting average by 63 points in the last 12 contests, has 41 hits, including 10 doubles, and 17 RBI on the year ... in the circle, Falcon pitchers have a combined ERA of 1.50, lowest in the MAC ... sophomore Liz Vrabel has an 11-11 record and a 1.22 ERA, while Heimrich has a 3-4 record and a 1.51 ERA ... Vrabel, who has 17 complete games in 20 starts, has struck out 117 batters and allowed opponents to hit just .215 against her ... Heimrich has an opponent batting average of just .181 ... senior Jody Johnson is 7-6 with a 1.99 ERA and an opponent BA of just .220.
RANGO GOES YARD, TIES A RECORD
Sophomore Gina Rango homered at Buffalo Thursday (April 15), for her sixth round-tripper of the season... that tied her for the school single-season record ... the mark was originally set by Jen Domschot (2000) and matched by Lynsey Ebel (2001) and Libby Voshell (2003) ... Rango, in just her second year in a BG uniform, has 11 career homers, tying her for fourth place on the Falcon career list ... Ebel (1998-2001) holds that school record, with 14.
MISCELLANEOUS NOTES
Senior Jody Johnson has an ERA of just 0.56 over her last four appearances, spanning 25 innings ... her one-hitter at Buffalo was the first of her career ... the Falcons successfully executed six sacrifice bunts in Saturday's twinbill vs. Ball State, with sophomore Abby Habicht laying down three and classmate Lindsay Heimrich two ... three different Falcons -- Heimrich, sophomore Gina Rango and freshman Jeanine Baca -- all went 10-for-23 (.435) at the plate last week ... all three had identical .609 slugging percentages as well ... BG hit .311 as a team on the week ... Baca hit .529 in MAC games last week, including a 7-for-10 (.700) performance in the Ball State series ... redshirt freshman Natalie Armintrout, in only her fifth at-bat of the season, had a pinch-hit single and picked up her first career RBI in the second game of Saturday's BSU doubleheader ... on the play, freshman Lauren Hoffman scored her first career run ... Armintrout, who had scored the first run of her career just five days earlier (vs. Oakland), came around to score two batters later, on Heimrich's inside-the-park homer ... Rango leads the Falcons with 13 multiple-hit games, while Baca has 12 and Heimrich 10 ... Rango and junior Kristen Anderson each have eight multi-RBI contests this spring, while Heimrich has six ... Heimrich's current hitting streak, 12 games, is the longest by a Falcon since Kandice Machain's 13-game streak in the 2002 season ... Machain and Libby Voshell each had 11-game streaks last year ... the school record is believed to be 17 games, by Jenny Ranz in the 1997 season ... senior Jenifer Kernahan has drawn 18 walks this year, by far the highest total on the team ... freshman Kari Steigerwald, in only 46 plate appearances, has seven walks ... six different Falcon players have hit at least one homerun this season, topping the total for all of last year by one ... BGSU now has a team total of 17 homers, after hitting a total of 20 a year ago ... BGSU has made a total of 10 errors in the last 10 games, after committing 19 errors in the previous six contests ... on the year, the Falcons are 6-13 when committing two or more errors in a game ... BG is 15-8 when making one error or fewer ... the Falcons have had 10 errorless games this year to date, going 8-2 in such contests.
