ST. PAUL, Minn. – The Concordia-St. Paul softball team (11-21, 5-7 NSIC) will look to stay hot as they wrap up a stretch of 10 of their first 12 NSIC games played at home with a doubleheader against #23 Winona State (24-10, 6-5 NSIC) on Wednesday before traveling to Aberdeen to take on Northern State (12-22, 2-8 NSIC) and MSU Moorhead (8-18, 1-9 NSIC) on the weekend.
Following Saturday's doubleheader with Northern State, the Golden Bears will remain in Aberdeen as they will take on MSU Moorhead at Presentation College on Sunday. Game time for the MSUM doubleheader is set for 1 p.m.
The Golden Bears enter play having won four of their last five to inch closer to the .500 mark in league action.
A big part of the recent success has been the work of
Linzy Heim in the circle. Heim has gone a perfect 3-0 during that span with a tidy 2.58 ERA to go along with 13 strikeouts in 19.0 innings of work. The junior has shown an excellent ability to work out of jams as she has allowed just eight (seven earned) of 33 baserunners to cross the plate in her last three starts.
In addition to the stellar pitching from Heim, the offense has really come to life as the team, which is hitting .273 on the year, has hit a hefty .341 over the past five games. The Golden Bears have averaged 6.6 runs per game during the streak as 10 of their 44 hits went for extra bases.
The trio of
Justine Schattner,
Jamie Fleischhacker and
Nicole Thompson has been at the forefront of the offensive surge as the top three hitters in the order have played at another level.
Schattner continues to tear up the NSIC in her first season on campus as she ranks third in RBI (35), 13
th in hits (41), 13
th in total bases (63) and 14
th in batting average (.398) on the season. She has been even better in the last five games as she has contributed a slash line of .467/.500/.933 with a pair of homers and 13 runs batted in.
Fleischhacker also moved up in the league rankings in several categories during this hot stretch of games as she has been working at the top of the CSP lineup. The senior leads the league in walks (26) while sitting in fifth in on-base percentage (.491) and 10
th in runs scored (26). Over the past five, she has slashed .538/.647/.769 with seven runs scored in her best stretch of the season to date.
Thompson pushed her average and on-base numbers even higher with seven hits in 11 trips in her last four games. That stretch moved her up to third in the NSIC in hitting (.442), fourth in on-base percentage (.495) and 12
th in hits (42) on the season.
Against Wednesday's opponent, the Golden Bears have gone 13-26 in 39 previous meetings. Concordia has had an even tougher time recently against the Warriors as Winona State has won the last six meetings. Concordia's last win came back in 2012 in Rochester.
The Golden Bears have had much more success against the weekend's opponents as they sit at 32-4 against Northern State and 29-7 against MSU Moorhead. CSP won the first 29 meetings against the Wolves, but NSU has won four of the last nine and the last two in a row. In the series with MSUM, Concordia has had a lot of success recently as 15 of the last 16 have gone in their favor, including the last three in a row.
