Games
Minnesota vs. New Mexico State: 6:30 pm CST
Arizona vs. St. John’s: 9:00 pm CST
The University of Arizona Wildcats (38-17) received the No. 12 seed in the 2015 NCAA Softball Tournament and will host the regional at Rita Hillenbrand Memorial Stadium May 15-17. The Wildcats are having a strong season but come into the regional having lost five of their last six games and are just 11-9 over their last 20.
Hitting has been the backbone of the Wildcats with a team average of .360 and 98 home runs on the season. Kellie Fox leads the way with a .405/.514/.762 slash line (BA, OPB, SLG) 62 RBI and 15 home runs. Two players have 20 plus home runs in sophomore utility Katiyana Mauga (25) and senior catcher Chelsea Goodacre (22). From the circle they enter with a team ERA of 4.25.
Arizona will face St. Johns (28-17) The Big East champions come into the tournament winning four out of five. They did have one game this season against a Pac-12 team when they dropped an 8-5 game to Oregon earlier this season. Offensively they are led by senior Erin Burner (.441) with and a .835 SLG and 48 RBI. They have also been solid in the circle posting a 2.97 ERA.
St. Johns will have their work cut out for them against the powerful Arizona line-up. The St. John Pitching staff has only given up 33 home runs on the season. They gave Oregon a good game earlier as well. Arizona is in the driver’s seat but their pitching staff needs to play well or this one could get interesting. Look for Arizona to advance.
In the second game Minnesota (46-9) will play New Mexico State (46-14). Minnesota will be favored on paper. An interesting statistic on the Gophers is that they are 19-1 in road games and 15-5 at neutral sites. Minnesota was in or around the top 10 all season long but hot a road bump at the Big Ten tournament dropping a 2-0 game to Iowa, a team that they had beat three times earlier in the season by a combined score of 25-0. The Gophers have been solid both in the circle and the batter’s box this season. Sophomore pitcher Sara Groenewegen (28-5) has been outstanding and entering the tournament with a 1.54 ERA and 344 strikeouts. She is been good at the plate as well batting .379 with 12 home runs. Look for Minnesota to ride Groenewegen throughout the tournament. They may be without senior Tyler Walker and her .356 batting average and team leading 50 RBI. They still have a very good line-up that features senior Kaitlyn Richardson and freshman standout Danielle Parlich. Richardson is the leader of this team and is third on the team in average (.366) and has hit 10 home runs on the season. Parlich is starting to collect awards for her great freshman campaign. She leads the team in batting average (.409).
New Mexico State comes in having won 11 of their last 12 games. They also have a win this season over Arizona State. They do have two losses to Arizona. One thing that jumps out when looking at the lines is that the Aggies have seven players batting above .350 and as a team they have hit 109 home runs on the season. Minnesota for comparison has 77 on the season. Groenewegen has only given up 14 home runs all season over 209.1 innings. With that said, New Mexico State has a dangerous line-up. Senior Staci Rodriguez is one of two players batting .408 on the season. The other is sophomore Brennalyn Nakamura. Rodriguez is second on the team in home runs (15). Leading the Aggies in homer runs is sophomore Fiana Finau (24).
On paper this favors Minnesota but Groenewegen will need to be at the top of her game and Minnesota will need to be as error free as possible. On the flip side the Aggies will have to figure Groenewegen out, something most teams have had a hard time doing so far this season. Look for Minnesota to advance.
If all teams play at the level they are capable this region should come down to Arizona and Minnesota. So bats (Arizona) versus pitching (Minnesota). We lean towards Minnesota due to the fact that they have both strong pitching and a solid line-up. In the end defense may be what wins the region with the team who makes the fewer errors advancing.
