MONROE, La. – The ULM softball team closes out its regular season with a three-game Sun Belt Conference series Thursday-Saturday, May 5-7, vs. the Ragin' Cajuns at the ULM Softball Complex. The Ragin' Cajuns are ranked No. 22 in the Softball America poll and No. 23 by D1Softball.com. The modified final week schedule lists start times for the Thursday and Friday games as 6 p.m. CT with Saturday's contest at 2 p.m. CT.
"They are a great ballclub and they are at the top of the conference for a reason," said ULM softball head coach
Molly Fichtner. "They have power, speed and pitching, and we need to be firing on all cylinders. When you are playing against an in-state opponent, too, there's a little more to play for."
ULM (27-23, 10-14) rallied to defeat Louisiana Tech 3-2 in eight innings Tuesday night. The Warhawks came from behind to tie the game twice and did not have a lead until
Korie Kreps drove in the winning run with an infield hit. Three different Warhawks drove in runs in Tuesday's win with
Lourdes Bacon's sacrifice fly and
Kennedy Page joining Kreps in the comeback effort. The Ragin' Cajuns come into Thursday's game having won six games in a row, including an SBC series sweep vs. Coastal Carolina last weekend. ULL scored at least five runs in all six victories.
At home, the Warhawks are averaging 4.9 runs per game and have a .277 batting average, both figures higher than their overall numbers. Junior first baseman
Kennedy Johnson, who leads ULM with a .358 batting average in all games, is hitting at a .395 clip in league games; and has the team's best average (.481) when at home. The Warhawk pitching corps have allowed fewer hits at home per game, 3.38 as compared to 5.88. Individually in the Sun Belt stat rankings,
Adrianna Chavarria (2.47) and
Kinsey Kackley (2.49) are eighth and ninth, respectively, in ERA. Chavarria is fifth in the Sun Belt and 59
th nationally, allowing 4.78 hits per seven innings.
The Ragin' Cajuns (38-11, 20-4) stand atop the Sun Belt Conference standings and hold the top spot in 11 statistical rankings in the conference. They are second in the nation in batting average (.357), fourth with an on-base percentage of .431 and seventh with a slugging percentage of .607. The team ERA of 2.15 is 23
rd and at the plate, they are 29
th in the country with 1.27 home runs per game.
Sophomore Jourdyn Campbell is just under the .400 mark for batting average at .398 to lead the Ragin' Cajuns and she is second in the Sun Belt Conference. The Ragin' Cajuns have produced the nation's highest doubles total with 92 with Sophie Piskos and Stormy Kotzelnick second and third, respectively, on the Sun Belt list for doubles per game. In the circle, Kandra Lamb leads the league with an ERA of 1.72, good for 53
rd nationally, and allows 3.81 hits per seven innings, second in the SBC and a No. 12 ranking in the nation.
The in-state rivals will meet for the 151
st time and the Ragin' Cajuns hold a 112-28 advantage in the series history. The Warhawks topped the then-14
th-ranked Ragin' Cajuns in the final regular-season game of 2021 2-1 before incurring a 7-0 loss in the Sun Belt Conference Championships.
Live stats for the final regular-season Sun Belt series vs. the Ragin' Cajuns will be available on the softball schedule page at
ULMWarhawks.com.
