Burlington, IA- The softball regular season is over for the Iowa Community College Athletic Conference (ICCAC) and it’s time for the conference tournament amongst the top four teams to face off in the Region 11 tournament.
The #1-seed Iowa Western Community College finished 33-17 (13-3) overall for the season with their three conference losses coming to Indian Hills CC once and Southeastern CC twice. The Reivers are led by Cydnee Schnieder with a conference leading 0.500 average and 58 RBIs; she’s also knocked 13 home runs.
Looking to knock out the #1-seed will be Southwestern CC. The Spartans won the tiebreaker against Marshalltown CC to sneak in with a 2-14 conference record, but an overall record of 14-28. Southwestern struggled, allowing over 10 runs per game in conference showdowns.
The Spartans will lean on Erika Kruse’s bat as her 0.451 average ranks second in the conference and she’s got a bit of power in her bat with 10 home runs and 39 RBIs on the year.
The #2-seed versus #3-seed series will be the most contentious. Southeastern will act as the home team with a conference mark of 12-4, while Indian Hills enters with an 11-5 conference record. In their season series, the two split their matchups with two games apiece despite SCC getting outscored 38 to 23.
The Blackhawks will depend on their pitching staff of Araceli Rivas (3.26 ERA) and Navy Clark (3.76 ERA) as they rank third and fifth, respectively, in the conference in earned run average. On offense, Lauren Summers provided the power to this squad with 13 home runs on the season.
The Warriors have their own ace in Sara Reid, her 15-6 record on the season with a 2.57 ERA ranks best and second-best in the conference, respectively. Ashlynn Sheets provides a nice alternative with a 3.25 ERA and 12 wins on the season. Julia Kwakernaak has power with 14 home runs and 49 RBIs, someone to look out for at the plate.
Both game ones will take place tomorrow, May 1st, with Southwestern CC taking on Iowa Western first at noon followed by Indian Hills versus Southeastern. Game twos will alternate for this best-of-three series. Thursday, May 2nd, will be the deciding game if the doubleheader is split on Wednesday with games starting at 2 pm.
The championship game is scheduled for May 5th with another best-of-three games series with May 6th acting as the final game if needed.