The Capital University’s Baseball and Softball teams are back on the field and swinging through their season, with some big victories and notable player performances.
After the cancellation of the season last year, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, baseball and softball are back. Bats are cracking, dust is flying, and our Crusaders are thrilled to be back on the field.
Though the schedule looks a little, because of protocols put in place by the Ohio Athletic Conference, teams now play back to back double headers on Saturdays and Sundays. Our Crusaders play host one day, and away the next facing off against the team from the day before.
These long weekends make for quite a challenge, but our teams have prepared the best they could going into the new look season. As it stands, our baseball team comes in with a 3-15 record and our softball team stands at 7-13.
Notably, however, each team has rallied some big wins throughout the year. Most recently our baseball team defeated the nations #5 ranked Marietta Pioneers in a thrilling 4-3 victory at home. Our Crusaders were led to victory by a big fifth inning, where they scored all four runs and a 5 inning relief pitched by Sophomore #5 Curtis Clark.
On the other diamond, our Crusaders Softball team began their season with three wins against Ohio Northern University. Sweeping the Polar Bears at home, and splitting the series with them on the road.
Our teams have been led through their season with key performances mentioned above. Specifically for baseball, on the offense side of things, the Crusaders batting average is being led by #2 Garrott Kennedy who is batting .360 to date. Furthermore, it is #6 Cole Callaghan, that has recorded the most hits thus far in the season. Switching sides to defensively, the Crusaders pitching staff is being led by #39 Connor Mclay with a 3.37 ERA and #17 Tucker Craft who leads the team with 20 strikeouts.
For Softball, their offensive leaders include #6 Allie Saulnier who is batting a team lead .375 and #19 Lexie Leggett who leads the team in RBI’s and hits with 17 and 11 respectively. On the bump for the Women’s team, it is standout pitcher #18 Brianna Shearer who leads the team with a 2.92 ERA and tallying 34 strikeouts on the year thus far.
Each team has some time to alter their records for the year prior to the OAC tournament selections. As the Softball team has 16 games left to play and Baseball with 20 games left prior to the tournament.
The squads are back in action against long standing rival the Otterbein Cardinals this weekend in back to back doubleheaders. Our women’s team will take to the road this Saturday, while the men look to defend Clowson Field. The first pitch for each game throughout Saturday and Sunday will be at 1:00 p.m. EST.
File photo courtesy of Capital Athletics
