Bowling Green State University Athletics
Vegas, Baby, Vegas! Falcons Play in UNLV Tourney This Weekend
March 10, 2005 | Softball
March 10, 2005
BOWLING GREEN, Ohio - The Bowling Green State University softball team, for the third weekend in a row, is on the road for tournament action ... the Falcons of seventh-year head coach Leigh Ross-Shaw, after spending last weekend in Fullerton, Calif., headed to Las Vegas for the Eller Media Stadium Classic this Thursday through Sunday (March 10-13) ... BGSU is slated to play a total of seven games in the tourney, including a contest against the top-ranked team in the country ... the schedule begins with Thursday (March 10) contests vs. North Carolina State and the host school, UNLV ... on Friday, the Brown and Orange will face Minnesota along with MAC foe Miami, before meeting New Mexico State and #1 Arizona on Saturday ... the weekend concludes with a Sunday game vs. Pacific.
The Falcons, after an 0-9 start to the 2005 season, closed last weekend with a come-from-behind victory over nationally-ranked Northwestern ... BGSU is coming off a 2004 season that saw the team finish 34-30 overall, and place third in the Mid-American Conference's West Division with a league mark of 13-11 ... the Falcons, the sixth seed for the six-team MAC Tournament, proceeded to lose the opening game, then reel off five consecutive wins to take the title and advance to NCAA Regional play.
HEAD COACH Leigh Ross-Shaw
Leigh Ross-Shaw, the winningest coach in school history, is in her seventh season as a collegiate head coach, all with the Falcons ... she currently has an overall record of 172-154-2 (.527) ... Ross-Shaw is also the school's leader in MAC games, with a league mark of 86-56 (.606) ... she ranks first in BG history in conference winning percentage, and is second in overall winning pct., trailing only Sandy Haines (.557; 57-45-3).
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 100 overall wins as well as 50 MAC victories ... Ross-Shaw is the only head coach in school history with three 30-win seasons, and continues to set new school marks with each win.
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, a 1992 graduate of the Univ. 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 2001, she was inducted into the UT Athletics Hall of Fame.
ASSISTANT COACH Kyle Jamieson
Kyle Jamieson is in his second season on Ross-Shaw's staff ... 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 had MAC ties prior to his arrival at BG, having spent the 2000 season on the staff at Toledo.
ABOUT THE FALCONS
Bowling Green enters the weekend with a record of 1-9 on the young season ... the Falcons dropped six games at the season-opening Frost Classic in Chattanooga (Feb. 25-27), and lost the first three contests of last weekend's Worth Invitational in Fullerton, Calif. (March 4-6), before closing the tourney with a win over #23/25 Northwestern, 5-4 ... the Falcons rallied from a 4-0 deficit for that win ... BGSU is hitting .186 as a team, and the Falcons have been held to 14 runs in the 10 games to date ... BG has shown signs of snapping out of that scoring slump, having totalled nine runs over the last two games ... individually, junior Gina Rango is hitting a team-high .318, with classmate Lindsay Heimrich batting .286 on the young season ... in the circle, junior Liz Vrabel has a 3.29 ERA, while Heimrich and freshman Emily Gouge have ERAs of 3.39 and 4.67, respectively ... the Falcons' fielding percentage is an impressive .974, as BG has been charged with just eight errors in 304 total chances.
THE OPPONENTS
North Carolina State has a 22-10 record, and the team split a home doubleheader with Florida State on Monday, after going 3-1 at East Carolina's tournament last weekend ... Jessica Willems is hitting .333, while Jennifer Chamberlain is batting .330 with five homeruns and 22 RBI ... Abbie Sims is 9-4 with a miniscule 0.64 ERA, and Shaina Ervin is 8-6 with an ERA of 1.74 ... the team went 32-27 overall and finished with an Atlantic Coast Conference record of 3-7 last season ... the school's athletics web site is www.GoPack.com.
UNLV enters the weekend with a 13-9 record after going 3-1 at the Las Vegas Classic last weekend ... Marissa Nichols is hitting .456 with 22 runs, 19 RBI and 15 extra-base hits (five of each variety), with Caitlyn Paus batting .343 ... Jacque Kerrigan has started 16 of the team's 22 games, and is 9-8 with a 2.03 ERA ... a year ago, the team went 25-32, including a 7-13 Mountain West Conference record ... the school's athletics web site is www.unlvrebels.com.
Minnesota has a 10-9 overall record on the season ... like the Falcons, the Golden Gophers were at the Worth Invitational last weekend, and like BG, UM went 1-3 ... UM and BG were scheduled to meet in Fullerton, but saw that game rained out ... Stephanie Sward is batting a team-high .381, while Megan Higgenbotham is hitting .300 and leads the Gophers with eight RBI ... three pitchers have started at least four games this year, with Lyn Peyer 5-5 with a 1.90 ERA ... last year, Minnesota was 33-23 overall and finished fifth in the Big Ten Conference with a 10-10 league mark ... the school's athletics web site is www.gophersports.com.
Miami is 6-8 after a 1-4 weekend at the Texas A&M Invitational ... the RedHawks have been led by Jackie Poggendorf at the plate, as she has a .375 batting average to date ... Jamie Arundel is hitting .367 ... Courtney Salmon is 4-3 in the circle, with a 3.40 ERA, while Poggendorf is 2-5 with a 4.05 ERA ... a year ago, the RedHawks went 25-26-1 overall and posted a 14-9 MAC record ... the school's athletics web site is www.MURedHawks.com.
New Mexico State is 10-11 this year, and have had an eight-game winning streak as well as losing streaks of five and six games ... the Aggies were idle last weekend, but are riding a two-game win streak ... Stacy Knight is hitting .407 on the young season, with Ashley Roszkos batting .390 ... Sarah Seagraves has an ERA of 4.07 and a 6-8 record ... last spring, NMSU was 14-49 and 2-17 in Sun Belt Conference action ... the school's athletics web site is www.nmstatesports.com.
Arizona is 15-0 and ranked #1 in the nation ... Caitlin Lowe is batting .479 and Kristie Fox .477, with Fox having homered five times and driven in 26 runs to date ... Alicia Hollowell is 10-0 with an ERA of 0.31 (three earned runs in 67 2/3 innings), while Taryne Mowatt has a 4-0 mark and an ERA of 0.53 ... last year, the Wildcats finished 55-6 overall and won the Pacific-10 Conference title with a 17-3 league record ... the school's athletics web site is www.arizonaathletics.com.
Pacific is 10-5 on the season, and the Tigers are receiving votes in the national polls ... Pacific was ranked among the top-25 last week, before going 1-2 in Fullerton ... like Minnesota, Pacific was slated to play BG last weekend, but that game was rained out ... the Tigers have wins over Ohio State, Notre Dame and #5 Stanford this season ... Michelle Anunciation leads the Tigers with a .412 batting average, while Jennifer Curtier has team-leading totals of four homers and 17 RBI ... Natalie King is 6-2 with a 3.41 ERA ... last season, Pacific went 36-23 overall and finished fourth in the Big West Conference with a 12-9 record ... the school's athletics web site is www.pacifictigers.com.
THE SERIES
The Falcons and North Carolina State are tied, 1-1, in the all-time series between the teams, with both meetings coming at last year's Buzz Classic in Marietta, Ga. ... BG captured a 6-2 win in bracket play, before N.C. State countered with a 2-1 decision in the playoff round two days later.
UNLV holds a 2-0 lead over BG, with the latest meeting coming in the UNLV Classic in 1998 ... that game was a 5-0 decision by the Rebels ... the initial game between the teams, a 5-4 UNLV win, came in 1995 in Fullerton, Calif.
The Falcons trail Minnesota, 2-0, in that series, with the lone meetings coming in 1998 ... the Gophers pasted the Falcons, 12-1, in five innings, but the teams then battled through an eight-inning game the next day, with Minnesota winning by a 5-3 count (March 7-8, 1998) ... both games took place at the Aggie II Invitational in College Station, Texas.
BGSU leads Miami, 45-29, and the Falcons have won five-straight meetings dating to 2002 ... last year's only two meetings came on the final day of the MAC Tournament, (May 16, 2004), with BG winning by scores of 1-0 and 4-3 to claim the league tourney crown.
New Mexico State holds a 3-2 series edge over the Brown and Orange, but BG won the last meeting, a 4-0 decision in NMSU's own tourney on the first weekend of the 2003 season (Feb. 14, 2003).
Arizona plastered the Falcons, 29-0 in five innings, in the team's lone prior meeting, on Feb. 16, 2001 ... in that game, the Wildcats, who would go on to win the national championship, got no-hit pitching to go along with six homers, including three grand slams ... one of those grand slams came off the bat of Jennie Finch ... UA took a 12-0 lead through three innings, then scored a whopping 17 runs in the fourth frame.
Pacific holds a 3-2 series lead over BGSU, with the last meeting coming in 2001 ... the Falcons picked up an 8-3 win in that season's opening game, at the Arizona Classic in Tucson (Feb. 16, 2001), before losing to host UA by 29 runs ... BGSU faced Pacific in the first tournament of the season four times in five years, culminating with that 2001 meeting.
