Live Stats
Live Video

ROCK HILL, SC—The Winthrop softball team will look to end its 10-game losing streak as it hosts South Carolina in a single game, Wednesday evening at Terry Field.

Winthrop is coming off a weekend in which it was swept in its first Big South Conference series of the season. The Eagles opened up conference action on Thursday, March 22 at home in a single game against Campbell, but the series won't be over until the double-header next Wednesday, April 4 in Buies Creek, NC.

The Eagles are 11-20 on the season and have been tested by the schedule that head coach Mark Cooke put together. Winthrop has faced eight Top 25 opponents, including five of the last 10 games. Winthrop is 1-7 against the Top 25 teams this season with the lone win coming against ninth-ranked Tennessee.

This will be the third meeting against the Gamecocks this season as Winthrop has been outscored 17-2. South Carolina leads the all-time series 50-10-1 and has won the last four meetings.

Last Thursday, Winthrop suffered a big loss as senior shortstop Megan Chapman went down with an injury in the bottom of the first against Campbell. Chapman is an All-Big South shortstop and is second don the team in batting at .345 with an on-base percentage of .433. Cooke was forced to mix up the batting order with Chapman's absence.

In the four games without her, Winthrop is hitting .218 with an on-base percentage of just .307 Winthrop scored four of its seven runs in the four-game span on Thursday in the 5-4 loss to Campbell. Before Chapman was injured, junior Teja Durante started to get hot at the plate and has hit safely in four straight games and has 10 hits in the last nine games. She moved to the top of the order in the final two games of the series with Charleston Southern and has raised her average to .263, which is third best on the team. She's hitting .462 with an on-base percentage of .500 in the four conference games.

Junior Chelsey Schoenfeldt still leads the team in batting at .360 and has a team-high 21 RBI (4^th in the Big South). She's hit safely in seven of the last nine games with five RBI. In the circle, Shoenfeldt hasn't been as fortunate as she's been on the losing end of all four conference losses and is now 5-11 on the year. She had a solid performance in game two of the double-header on Saturday as she tossed 6.2 innings allowing one run on five hits before giving way to Natalie Becker in the top of the 7^th. Schoenfeldt took the loss after Becker gave up a three-run shot.

Also swinging a hot bat for the Eagles lately is freshman Kristy Noble. She's boosted her season average to .240 and is riding a seven-game hit streak and has reached base in eight straight games. In the four conference games, Noble is batting .364 with two runs, a homer and two RBI and is perfect in the field with nine putouts and six assists.

Becker is 5-8 on the year and had a very impressive relief outing in game one of the Charleston Southern series. Becker didn't allow a hit or a run in 6.1 innings as she walked one and struck out nine, but the Eagles were shutout in a 1-0 loss. It was the fourth time Winthrop had been shutout this season.
Wednesday night's starter could be Becker or Schoenfeldt.

South Carolina enters the game with a 19-16 record and has lost seven straight including four straight games without a run. Despite that, the Gamecocks are still averaging 5.1 runs per game and feature a line-up that has enjoyed facing the Eagles this season.

Senior Lauren Lackey is batting a team-high .416 with 20 runs and 14 RBI while junior Samie Garcia is batting .409 with a team-high 29 runs, seven doubles, two triples, four homers and 19 RBI. Junior Evan Childs is hitting .317 with 23 runs, nine home runs and 30 RBI (leads team in both HR and RBI).

Freshman Katelynn Howser has been the top pitcher for the Gamecocks as she's sporting an 8-4 record with a 3.20 ERA in 92 innings of work.