Milligan’s softball team kicked off their year with the Annual Fall Classic at Winged Deer Park in Johnson City.
The team played both Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 14 and 15, and came away with wins on both days. The win for the Buffs on Saturday was against Enterprise State Community College 4-1.
The second match of the day was against Walters State Community College, but the game was unfinished due to rain. The score, before the match was called, was 2-1 in favor of Walters State, but the game has not yet been rescheduled. Sunday’s games were against Anderson University and Tusculum where the ladies lost 8-2 and won 7-1, respectively.
“Overall the team did very well in our games, the pitching and defense was good, but we need to do a better job on hitting and especially clutch hitting with runners in scoring opportunities,” says Wes Holly, head softball coach.
The win against Tusculum was also Coach Holly’s 900th win as the Milligan softball coach.
The ladies are coming off of a highly successful season, placing second in the conference tournament and top three overall. The loss that ended their tournament run came against Brenau where they lost 6-1. They finished the year with a 22-18 (16-10 AAC) record.
The team started to prepare for this tournament at the beginning of the school year. “The prep for the tournament went really well. We’ve been working really hard on getting back into the groove of things and our team chemistry,” said Karsten Miller, a junior outfielder. “We have been intersquading (playing scrimmage games against each other) at practice and really working on fundamentals with lots of drills and getting reps in hitting.”
The preparations for this tournament haven’t varied too far off what the team has done in past years; however, there is a special addition to the practices for the team this year. “We haven’t done anything more specific than last year’s prep, other than getting to use our new, amazing lights at night practices!” said Miller. The new softball lights were one of the four renovations to multiple athletic facilities during the summer.
“This tournament is going to be a great stepping stone for the rest of our fall season, leading into winter workouts and our spring season,” said Miller, “We are playing four really good, solid teams this weekend so the competition and play should be tough. I think these games will really set the tone for our season. We are looking to play this year better than ever before.”
The team is looking forward to improving this season and make it an even more successful one than the last. “We have one of the most talented teams I have played on in my career, and I am extremely excited to see how far we can go. We came so close last season to going all the way to nationals, so I’m really looking forward to the journey this season!” said Miller.
“We still have more fall games which will help with the team chemistry,” says Holly. “We can re-evaluate how we are performing in mid-October to also see what we need to work on for winter in preparing for the spring season.”
The spring schedule for the Buffs is now available on the Milligan Athletics site.
Headline photo: Milligan’s softball team at the tournament. Credit to Karsten Miller.