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District Spotlight: Numerous teams look forward to postseason
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You will need a scorecard to keep track of all the district college teams that are headed to postseason action in baseball, softball, tennis and track and field in the next couple weeks.
Here's a look at who's going where and when.
Division III baseball
Top-seeded Thomas More (24-11) will meet no. 4 Grove City (15-16) and No. 2 Westminster (24-14) will play No. 3 Thiel (26-12) Thursday in the first round of the double-elimination Presidents' Athletic Conference tournament. The champion will receive the league's first automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
Division II softball
Top-seed Lock Haven (43-6), ranked second nationally, will play No. 8 Bowie State tomorrow in the opening round of the double-elimination NCAA Division II Mid-Atlantic Region Championship at Kutztown, Pa. No. 2 Bloomsburg plays No. 7 Slippery Rock; No. 3 Kutztown plays Shippensburg; No. 4 California plays No. 5 West Chester.
Lock Haven features junior Kristin Erb, who pitched a perfect game in a 3-0 victory against Bloomsburg as the Eagles won the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference championship. Erb has 24 shutouts this season and is 37-6 with an 0.24 earned-run average. She is hitting .348 with 29 RBIs. Lock Haven, the national runner-up last season, has won eight in a row and 19 of its past 20 games.
Division III softball
Sixth-seeded Bethany (22-21), which recently won its 12th PAC title, will play No. 3 Rochester (28-10) Thursday in the opening round of the double-elimination NCAA Ithaca (N.Y.) Region. Bethany will start Heather Immesberger (16-8, 2.41 ERA) against Rochester, winner of 16 in a row.
• Seventh-seed Penn State Behrend (33-12) will play No. 2 Ramapo in the first round Thursday of the NCAA Ithaca Region. Behrend won five in a row after losing its opening game of the tournament to earn a bid as champion of the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference. Behrend is led by second baseman Nikki Kaschauer (.401, 34 RBI), a junior from South Park, and pitcher Julie Koman (20-4, 1.42 ERA), a junior from Montour.
• Washington & Jefferson (26-11) is the No. 2 seed in the ECAC Southern Division III championship and will be the host this weekend at Brooks Park. Misericordia (32-12) is the top seed but is unable to be the host of the double-elimination tournament. Washington & Jefferson's first game will be at noon Saturday. Also in the field are Alvernia (31-11, No. 3 seed), Gwynedd-Mercy (22-15, No. 4), Lake Erie (21-18, No. 5) and Swarthmore (21-18, No. 6).
Division III tennis
Top-seed Washington & Lee advanced to the Elite 8 of the NCAA women's championships May 13-18 with a 5-2 victory against host Carnegie Mellon in the final of the South Atlantic Region. CMU's two wins were recorded by the freshman team of Kelly Hart and Ashley Herrick at No. 2 doubles and senior Amy Staloch at No. 1 singles. The Tartans finished 18-8.
• The Kenyon Lords reached the Elite 8 of the NCAA men's championships May 13-18 with a 5-1 victory against host Carnegie Mellon (19-8) in the finals of the Great Lakes Region. CMU's only win was James Muliawan at No. 2 singles.
Division II women's tennis
Fifth-ranked California University of Pennsylvania (23-2), the PSAC champion which has won nine matches in a row with eight by shutout, plays St. Michael's and Slippery Rock (20-3) meets Holy Family in the NCAA regional Thursday at Bryant College. California's Helena Van Eysendeyk was MVP of the PSAC tournament.
Broken records
Slippery Rock's Brad Mueller, a graduate of Mars High School who played football at Boston College, set a school record with a time of 10.47 seconds in the 100-meter dash as the Rock won the men's PSAC team title at the outdoor track and field championships. Mueller was the only Slippery Rock athlete to take first place in an event.
• Slippery Rock's women won their third consecutive PSAC title with six first-place finishers, led by Jennifer Hansen's conference-record 13-33/4 in the pole vault.
Division III track and field
Grove City won the men's title and Westminster won the women's title at the PAC championships.
First Published May 6, 2008 12:00 am
