SHAWNEE – The end of the regular season is here, and this weekend's trip for Oklahoma Baptist (38-12, 24-6 GAC) at No. 8 Southern Arkansas (42-5, 25-4 GAC) is the biggest of the year.
SAU is in first place in the league. Should the Muleriders win the series, they'll claim the GAC regular season title and clinch the top seed for the conference tournament in Bentonville. For the Bison, they have a chance to win the regular season outright, but that will require a sweep in Magnolia.
Historically, SAU leads OBU 25-8, however, the Bison have won each of the last three regular-season series. Below are notes on the teams.
For the Bison:
The green and gold won their series at Southern Nazarene last weekend. In the process, OBU moved its win total to 38, besting last year's mark of 36.
For the second straight week, OBU was not listed in the NCAA DII Central Region Rankings. The main reason: the strength of the GAC. Seven of the 12 teams have no better than a .469 winning percentage.
OBU's offense has been stellar this spring. They rank in the top-two of the GAC in 11 offensive categories. That includes being the leader in homers (64), stolen bases (106) and walks drawn (230).
Senior
Greenlee Wells leads the offense: She's No. 2 nationally with 19 homers and a .626 on-base percentage. Wells also ranks 15th with 59 RBI and 17th with 54 runs. Get this: on the GAC stat page, she is slotted top-three in eight different categories.
Slugger
Ally Ryan is also fourth in the league with 14 bombs and fifth with 43 RBI. Her 134 RBI rank fifth in school history while her 41 homers are slotted second.
Last weekend in Bethany,
Kaley Cook stole a few bags to run her season total to 48. That's the most in single-season history at OBU, passing a 1993 total from Mary May (46). For Cook, her 48 steals this spring rank lead the GAC and are fourth in D2.
Pitchers
Jaycee Shaffer and
Jaycee Kelln will have to be on point this weekend. SAU has the best batting average (.355) in the GAC and rank first in hits (455) and doubles (82).
For OBU's pitchers, they each rank top-five in the league in strikeouts, totaling 285. They also rank highly averaging at least 6.8 strikeouts per seven innings.
For the Muleriders:
SAU was won nine in a row and 12 of its last 14 games. They are 15-2 at home this year.
The Muleriders are awfully good on offense and defense. They lead the GAC in batting average (.355), ERA (2.01), hits (455) and shutouts (12), SAU is also second in homers (48) and team strikeouts per seven innings (5.81).
Pitcher Emma Duncan is having a fabulous season. She's No. 2 in the country with 25 wins, fifth with eight shutouts and ninth with a 1.39 earned run average.
On the offensive front, SAU has three different batters that rank top-four in the GAC in average: Maddie Leal (.451), America Rubio (.425) and Sophia Luetticke (.423).
For Leal, she has a GAC-high 65 hits and is second with a .564 on-base percentage.
Also of note, Rubio and Paris Endris each are slotted fifth in the league with 11 home runs.
