April 5, 2005

HOUSTON - Wednesday afternoon in Huntsville, Texas, the Houston softball team will square off in a doubleheader against host institution Sam Houston State in the second and third meetings between the two schools this season.

On Feb. 11 of this year, the Cougars came away with a 3-2 win over the Bearkats at the Houston Hilton Plaza Invitational, a win that gave the Cougars their first victory of the 2005 season.

Houston (18-20) will be playing on the road in its third straight series away from Cougar Softball Field, marking the longest road stretch for the team this season.

Last weekend, the team dropped both games of a doubleheader to Texas A&M-Corpus Christi on the road, and will be looking to bounce back after hitting a program high eight game losing streak.

The Bearkats (15-18), who haven't played a game since March 25 when they split a twin bill with Texas-Arlington, will be looking to avenge their loss to Houston earlier this year.

In the all-time series between the two programs, the Cougars hold a strong 6-1 lead in the seven-game series with their lone loss to Sam Houston coming back in the inaugural season of Cougar Softball, a 4-0 loss on April 11, 2001.

For the Bearkats, outfielder Stephanie Mosley leads the team in batting with a .407 average off of 33 hits in 81 at-bats, resulting in 17 runs, 10 doubles and 13 RBI.

In all SHSU has five players hitting over the .300 mark, but those hitters have produced just eight combined homeruns on the year. Infielder Mandy Collier leads the team in long bomb with four this season, but is batting just .202 in 89 at-bats.

In the circle, Sam Houston has split the pitching duties between Shalayne Blythe and Melissa Collins as the two have shouldered 184.1 of the total 213.2 innings the team has played this year, and have recorded 75 and 87 strikeouts, respectively.

Houston will be looking to seniors Kristen Glowacz and Kim Nesloney along with the rest of the lineup to put the bat on the ball and provide the some Cougar runs.

Both Glowacz and Nesloney currently rank No. 6 in the Conference USA standings with 32 runs apiece. Glowacz also leads the conference in homeruns with 11 bombs, and is second in RBI with her 34 this year.

Back in February, Glowacz, Nesloney and junior Brandi Clark each recorded two hits against the Bearkats, helping Houston to a 3-2 win on nine hits.

Action begins on Wednesday, April 6, at the Sam Houston Bearkat Softball Field in Huntsville, Texas, beginning with a 1 p.m. start for the first game and a scheduled 3 p.m. start for the second.