SB Final: Louisiana 3, ULM 1

[cajunref]

Agreed, was sitting in outfield, she trapped it.

[NewsCopy]

Louisiana softball won their opening game in the Sun Belt Tournament 3-1, behind starting pitcher Sam Landry.

The rest of the story
ESPN 1420

[CajunVic]

Glasco had a good argument absent replay, but replay unequivocally confirmed the ball hit the ground before her glove.

[ragin50]

Tough game. Landry gave up 2 hits in the 2nd inning then shut down in order the next 13 or 14 batters. I guess Megan will pitch tomorrow?

Great job by Sam! You better get to her early or she usually gets stronger and is lights out. She was throwing harder in the 7th than in the 1st, 68 or 69 at the end.

[JayWalker]

Base umpire didn't make the out call until Davis held up the ball like she caught it. She deeked him.

[SlickRick]

Great job by Sam! You better get to her early or she usually gets stronger and is lights out. She was throwing harder in the 7th than in the 1st, 68 or 69 at the end.

She was throwing gas at the end of the game! Also, if you haven't read the article in the Advocate, Coach commented on how does a team go 20-2 and not get 1 pitcher first team all conference. Same for last year too, when we went 23-4. Sam had a couple of quotes as well:

“They were very aggressive, so I think I quickly learned that I could keep the ball not exactly on the plate and get them swinging,” Landry said. “That took me a few innings to figure out, because at first I was trying to go at them instead of walking them.”

“Without saying much, I think our pitchers are getting a little disrespected in the Sun Belt when it comes to all-conference teams,” Landry said. “I think the past two years not having a single one of our pitchers on first team doesn’t show our results. We’re out here working and we plan to prove them wrong.”

[CajunVic]

Because we distribute our pitching around, votes for our pitchers may have been diluted.

[ninacajun]

I have an extra ticket for both games today if anyone is interested. Probably for tomorrows game as well.

[SlickRick]

Because we distribute our pitching around, votes for our pitchers may have been diluted.

Conference 2022: Sam was 12-1 with 1.97 ERA and 66 SO's in 44.1 innings.
Conference 2023: Megan 8-1 with 1.48 ERA and 69 SO's in 56.2 innings.

But, because we have a pitching staff and not a true ace, we don't have the numbers the other clubs have. Nester pitched over 200 innings this season while Sam has 124 with the most innings. Anyway, it's just painful for a team playing the weakest schedule by far in the conference, and they get the most players on first team.

[RaginDave]

Conference 2022: Sam was 12-1 with 1.97 ERA and 66 SO's in 44.1 innings.
Conference 2023: Megan 8-1 with 1.48 ERA and 69 SO's in 56.2 innings.

But, because we have a pitching staff and not a true ace, we don't have the numbers the other clubs have. Nester pitched over 200 innings this season while Sam has 124 with the most innings. Anyway, it's just painful for a team playing the weakest schedule by far in the conference, and they get the most players on first team.

Don't forget that Ms. Lamb and Ms. Heath were pretty outstanding as well, Lamb as a closer and Heath as an extra arm to help when needed. We might be the only team in the country that handles our Softball pitching staff like a baseball staff, probably because of who the pitching coach is.

[CajunVic]

People just don’t understand the committee . . .

[cjr3888]

EDIT: Tickets taken.

I have 2 tickets for today if anyone wants them.

[RaginDave]

Almost the best case scenario for the Cajuns/SBC in the softball tournament. The 4 teams left are:

RPI

10 Louisiana
40 Texas State
41 USA
51 Marshall

with the loss yesterday Troy slipped behind Marshall, so your top 4 SBC RPI ranked teams are in the semifinals. All are at or above Top 50 teams, meaning if UL keeps winning, they will play 2 more Top 50 RPI teams, in Texas State tonight and the winner of Marshall/USA, assuming if Marshall wins the will move up inside the Top 50.

[VObserver]

Don't forget that Ms. Lamb and Ms. Heath were pretty outstanding as well, Lamb as a closer and Heath as an extra arm to help when needed. We might be the only team in the country that handles our Softball pitching staff like a baseball staff, probably because of who the pitching coach is.

It is becoming increasingly common. Note that ULM used 2 pitchers last night, even though the first was still fairly effective when they pulled her. I didn't talk to their coach, so I don't know their reasoning, but since she was pulled exactly when she had gone through the lineup once, I suspect it was an attempt to keep our hitters off balance by giving them a different look.

Just for gits and shiggles, here is an interesting statistic: Pitching Appearances/Games Played for the last six teams remaining in the tournament [before last night]

ULM: 134/57 = 2.351
Louisiana: 130/57 = 2.281
Troy: 103/53 = 1.943
Texas State: 100/57 = 1.754
Marshall: 79/53 = 1.491
South Alabama: 74/52 = 1.423

Clearly, ULM and Louisiana have a quicker hook than the other four, though perhaps not for the same reasons. Still, these higher numbers seem to indicate a more "baseballish" approach to handling pitchers, while Texas State and Troy are somewhere in the middle and South Alabama and Marshall are clearly softball teams.

These numbers may be meaningless, in that we only know the pattern used by our coach, which is baseballish, and not of any of the others.

[SlickRick]

Marsha against Olivia Lackie.