Cougars ready to back No. 1 ranking

The Cougars will take on the winner of the Missouri Baptist/Park game at 1:45 p.m.

The softball team looks to continue the tradition established by other Cougar teams this year, with men’s basketball and men’s soccer winning conference tournament championships and men’s and women’s volleyball winning NAIA national titles.

The Cougars (41-14, 9-1) come in with only one conference loss on the year, being upset by Williams Woods on April 16.

“Anyone can beat anybody on any given day,” Cougar coach Wendy Spratt said. “Our loss to Williams Woods was a perfect example of that.”

Since the surprising loss, the No. 11 NAIA Cougars have won 13 of their last 14 to reach the 40-win plateau for the second year in a row. Last year, Columbia College won the AMC regular-season championship with the same 9-1 record but lost in both the conference tournament championship game and in the opening round of the NAIA National Tournament.

The team brings in the AMC’s top offense at 4.81 runs per game as well as the conference’s best defense, allowing only 1.72 runs per game. In addition, the Cougars have the best earned run average (0.86 ERA) and fielding average (.950) in the conference.

“(AMC opponents) know our potential,” said Cougar senior Sheri Zeiger. “They need to watch out for our bats. We can all hit, from No. 1 in the lineup to No. 9.”

The Cougars feature several players who lead the conference in a number of categories. Freshman pitcher Jayne Miller led the AMC with a 0.54 ERA and went 16-5 in this her freshman year. 1999 NAIA honorable mention All-American Carly Millsap leads all catchers, throwing out 21 baserunners with an astonishing .567 percentage. Tara Adams is the conference leader in doubles (16), Tara Gaines in triples (8) and Kristina Jones in homers (6).

“We have a little bit of everything,” Spratt said. “We can put up a lot of points, and we have better pitching than anyone in the conference.”

Right behind the Cougars in the AMC standings is McKendree College. The No. 2 seed Bearcats (23-20, 8-2) began the year with five consecutive losses but managed to sweep William Woods in an April 18 doubleheader. Despite their lackluster performance in the regular season, Spratt knows McKendree’s best softball comes late in the season.

“They tend to start poor but take off come tournament time,” Spratt said. “When the postseason comes, they like to win.”

For the past three years, the Bearcats have won the NAIA Region V tournament title and have beaten the Cougars in the AMC tournament championship game the past two seasons.

The only other team to have a winning conference record is William Woods (22-31, 6-4).

The team struggled throughout the year having lost their No. 1 through No. 5 hitters in the lineup from a year ago. Also, their top pitcher last year, Lynn Auto, was out with injuries for most of this season.

The team has responded with four players getting more than 20 RBIs in the year, with Tia Schmitz and Alicia Davis tied for fifth in the AMC with 29 RBIs each.

No. 4 seed Missouri Baptist (26-16, 5-5) is the only other serious contender in the six-team tournament with Park (13-33) and Hannibal-LaGrange (1-26, 0-10) struggling to put up wins all year.

The tournament gets started with the opening round games at noon today with the championship game set for Saturday afternoon.

The Cougars have already received an automatic bid to the NAIA Region V Tournament next week but know a strong performance in the conference tourney will go a long way.

“Even though we’re already in the regionals, we’ll try our best to win the AMC (tournament),” Zeiger said. “We could use all the momentum we can get heading into the national tournament.”

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