The Tigers softball team rolled through their Feb. 28 weekend homestand, topping Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference rival University of Dallas and Howard Payne University. The sweep against UD propelled the Tigers to third in the conference standings with a 6-2 record, trailing behind Southwestern University and No. 8 Texas Lutheran University.
Coming off a rocky series against the SCAC leading Texas Lutheran University — the No. 8 Division III team nationally — the Tigers continued with a three-game series against UD on Feb. 28 and March 1 and a doubleheader against HPU on March 2. The bats came to life throughout the weekend, outscoring UD 30-6 and HPU 17-6.
“I think definitely we’ve had some of our biggest competitors at the beginning of the season, which obviously didn’t go our way,” junior left fielder Hayden Del Toro said. “What we’ve learned and what kind of showed up in the last series [against TLU] is that staying to ourselves gets us really far in our games, and I think it’s important to make that adjustment for the rest of our games.”
Junior pitcher and outfielder Jordan Arce took note of how she prepared for her pitching debut at home coming off two weeks of rest.
“I feel like I’ve been working really hard in the bullpen,” Arce said. “I think my mentality is definitely going to be more in tune with my body … It’s a different environment when you’re pitching and have all your fans … supporting. I think having that extra little boost of home field advantage in the sense of mentality-wise, I think it’ll be really fun to get out there and play five games and have that opportunity to just go out there, dominate and win.”
Arce started on Feb. 28, giving up one hit and one run in the Tigers’ 9-1 rout against UD. She pitched again in the third game against UD on March 1, filling in for sophomore pitcher Megan Kriechbaum in the third inning and closed out the game. Arce was the winning pitcher for both games she pitched against UD, improving her pitching record to 3-1.
In the third game against UD, Del Toro recorded a season high of three hits in a single game. Prior to the UD series, Del Toro discussed the adjustments she made to her hitting game.
“One thing about me is that I need to relax a little bit more,” Del Toro said. “Sometimes I get a little bit too overanalyzing of the pitch that’s coming or exactly where my hand should be going to the ball, but I do a lot better whenever I just kind of relax and ‘see ball, hit ball,’ and take a big hack.”
Sophomore second baseman Sammi Tagawa also provided a spark to the Tigers offense. Tagawa continued her 10-game hitting streak since the weekend sweep, providing seven RBIs to boot. Tagawa credited her productivity on offense to her approach at the plate.
“I’m usually pretty good about drawing walks, [not] swinging at strikes, stuff like that,” Tagawa said. “It’s just finding the right pitch to hit and making sure it’s what I’m ready for and what I’m looking for.”
Tagawa also attributes her team for helping shape her game on the field. “All of us are different individual players,” Tagawa said. “But once you spend enough time together and once you get to really know each other, then you just automatically build that trust with each other. So I have that trust with my teammates on the field and that helps me a lot to be more confident in myself as an individual player because I know they all have my back, and no matter what, they’ll always pick me up in the end.”
The Tigers rounded out their homestand on March 5 with 12-0 and 13-3 wins over Carnegie Mellon. They now will briefly hit the road for a three-game series against SCAC rival McMurry University on March 8 and 9.
