BIG EAST Softball Championship Set to Kick-Off
CHICAGO – The field is set for the 2016 BIG EAST Softball Championship, presented by Jeep as No. 1 seed DePaul will face No. 4 Butler and No. 2 Villanova will square off with defending champion No. 3 St. John’s.
The Blue Demons captured second regular season BIG EAST title in three years, posting a 16-3 record in conference play and are riding a six-game win streak. DePaul features five All-BIG EAST selections, including Player of the Year Morgan Maize. Maize posted a BIG EAST-best .444 batting average and also ranked atop the league in hits (28), runs scored (22), RBI (27), and total bases (55) while ranking second in home runs (6) and slugging percentage (.873). The Blue Demons took 2-of-3 games from the Bulldogs in their regular season series.
Making their first appearance in the BIG EAST Championship, Butler is paced offensively by All-BIG EAST First Team member Maggie MacBeth. MacBeth ranks seventh in the conference in batting with a .397 average. In the circle the Bulldogs have all-conference second team member Kristin Gutierrez, whose 2.55 earned run average was fourth in the league in conference play.
Coming into the postseason off of their best performance in BIG EAST play since 2002, the Wildcats boast the conference’s Pitcher of the Year in Kate Poppe and Freshman of the Year in Lauren Hanna. In addition to Poppe and Hanna, Villanova features six other all-conference selections. Poppe, a senior, threw in a league-high 87.1 innings while recording 11 wins, tied for tops in the BIG EAST, and she ranks second in Division I among active career leaders with 977 strikeouts. Villanova swept St. John’s in their three meetings in the second week of BIG EAST play.
The Red Storm come into the four-team field as the defending champions, having defeated Seton Hall in last year’s final. St. John’s defeated Villanova in the semifinals of the 2015 BIG EAST Championship. The Johnnies will look to Savannah Warren who, during BIG EAST play, posted four home runs, five doubles, 13 RBI, 13 runs and a .377 batting average.
The two-day championship held at the Ballpark at Rosemont is set to begin Friday, May 14 at with DePaul-Butler beginning at Noon CT followed by Villanova-St. John’s at 3 p.m. CT. The Championship game will be held Saturday at 2 p.m. CT. All three games will be broadcast on FS2.