The Baker University softball team guaranteed itself the sixth seed in the Heart of America Athletic Conference tournament by sweeping Missouri Valley University on Wednesday in Marshall, Mo.
The Wildcats won the two games by scores of 6-1 and 7-0. With the two wins and 2 losses over the weekend vs. Lindenwood University, the ‘Cats finished out the regular season with an overall record of 23-20 and 12-9 in conference play.
After losing both games of the doubleheader against Lindenwood University on April 22, head coach Jennifer Rigdon said the team needs to improve its hitting.
“Basically, we’re getting hits,” Rigdon said, “but we’re not scoring runs. We’re just leaving runners on base.”
Besides practicing, Rigdon has tried some things to help score more runs.
“We’ve tried to move some people around in the lineups,” she said. “We’ve been working on stealing more bases.”
The changes seemed to work much better on Wednesday against Missouri Valley.
In the first game, junior pitcher Jana Smith gave up only one run and struck out eight batters. In the second game, junior Lindsey Lantau held the opposing batters scoreless while posting 11 strikeouts. Junior short stop Kendra Cody said the team played much better in its two final games of the regular season.
“We did awesome,” Cody said. “We were producing runs and everybody was getting hits. We all did a good job of getting runners moved around when we needed to.”
Cody said winning the two games was important for the team’s seeding in the conference tournament, which will put them against Culver-Stockton College in the first round, a team they lost to earlier in the season.
“We’re pretty excited because we know we can beat Culver,” she said. “We’re ready to get back at them.”
Junior first baseman Leslie Kersting said the Wildcats need to do a few things when they play in the HAAC tournament.
“We need to be consistent and score runs,” Kersting said. “We need to come together as a team and play like we know we can.”
Cody said the team has the ability to beat anyone in the tournament.
“We know we can beat anybody we play this weekend,” Cody said. “We just need to play well.”
The team will begin the postseason today in the HAAC tournament in Canton, Mo., when they take on Culver-Stockton College.