dropping 4 of 5 games in a Charleston South Carolina tourney. Losing to Purdue, host Charleston, Wichita State and Central Michigan and beating only Wichita State.
Softball off to a tough start
- Thread starter California Panther
- Start date
As I said in the other thread, our top pitcher got hit with a line drive in the third inning of the first game and didn't pitch again the rest of the weekend. Probably had at least something to do with the results.
Yes, Sarah Dawson is their best pitcher and pitched 2 2/3 innings and the rest of the staff pitched pretty badly. They hit well enough to win the majority of games, but the pitching was bad and it didn't help that they made tons of errors too.
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The defense was bad, but the pitching was absolutely horrible. These all are Aprile’s recruits and Dawson is the only one who is even worthy of being a third starter. She has days where she looks like a #1 starter, but is inconsistent. The pitcher from Missouri who was Aprile’s top pitching recruit last year, never enrolled and supposedly followed Aprile to Louisville as a walk-on.
Softball crushed by 2 more B1G teams today, Wisconsin 8-0 and Nebraska 14-1. Ouch, we're now 1-6 after a fabulous year last year, hope we start to turn it around soon. 2 more games vs UW and UNL yet to come this weekend.
In 9 games, here are the absolutely putrid statistics:
1-8 record. 28 runs scored (3 per game); 89 runs allowed (9.9 per game); 20 errors (more than 2 per game); and team batting average of .220.
From one out away from winning the ACC tournament to this mess in one season.
1-8 record. 28 runs scored (3 per game); 89 runs allowed (9.9 per game); 20 errors (more than 2 per game); and team batting average of .220.
From one out away from winning the ACC tournament to this mess in one season.
so what is wrong, the level of early competition, new coaching staff?--I know we got clobbered in 5 B1G games
As has been said, a big part of what's wrong is that the team's best pitcher, and what is starting to look like their only decent pitcher, got hit by a line drive in the third inning of the first game of the season and has not pitched again since.
That's not the only thing, but it's where you want to start looking for answers.
That is the major thing. But the defense has been very bad too and the hitting, although it hasn't been brutal, has not been good enough either. They have 6 positional starters back, 3 of their 4 pitchers and many of their bench players back. The schedule has been average, but they really should have been able to be no worse than 5-4 right now and instead they are 1-8 and getting run ruled in half of their games. Even without Dawson, the wheels shouldn't have fallen off like this.
Pitt beats the nitters 2-0.
FWIW, Penn State is also awful. I think after that loss they are now 3-9.
FWIW, Penn State is also awful. I think after that loss they are now 3-9.
Or maybe just not put an insulting offer on the table after she won her division.
But it is way too early to judge the results of this intentional coaching staff change.
When your AD played softball, hires a new coach, and they start 3-15, you have to wonder.
Feels a whole lot like Barnes, who was supposed to know a lot about basketball.
Feels a whole lot like Barnes, who was supposed to know a lot about basketball.
I was going to say.got to keep her here.and to let to her go to Louisville of all places.
Yeah, I have no clue but this Heather one didn't make sense at least based on performance. She's said more than once ' I have to be able to work with who I hire'. Maybe more to do with that.
3-20 Now after losing to Duke. Again, too early to judge, change is difficult. But this is really disappointing.
Another game lost in the opponent's last at bat. That seems to have happened a lot to them this year so far.
now we have what looked like the start of a pretty good program that’s now turned into a train wreck.winning is all that matters,not if you get along with someone.if we all took that approach we would be in sad shape in anything we do.
Today we're down 18-0 in the 5th inning of the first game of the DH against VT. VT is ranked near the bottom of the Top 25. They have 18 runs, we have 2 hits!
And to think that just last year they were one out away from the ncaas and beating the eventual national champion to get there.and now were at this point.pretty sad.
Yes indeed this questionable move by HL has set the program back. The question now is does she have the backbone to admit a mistake and fix it? Hope winning is all that matters and not the cost of a buyout .....
The rest of the coaches that she didn't hire better take notice.It would be a dam# shame for volleyball to go down the crapper like softball has.That is one team that is a joy to watch.And softball was too until this year.
Well, they were last year but really haven’t much historically which makes it even more puzzling they didn’t or couldn’t or wouldn’t keep the status quo. Like volleyball, it’s a ACC sport where Pitt has a chance to be credible right now.
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I believe their top pitcher, Sarah Dawson, was injured after only 2+ innings... Is senior shortstop Olivia Gray also injured? She has only played 9 games.
Gray is cleared to play. She entered the game today midway thru the contest. Dawson is still in streetclothes from what I see so that’s not a good sign. This teams issues goes waaay deeper than the injury report so if you are thinking injuries are the root cause of this problem think again. A healthy Dawson and Gray would only mask some of the issues at hand....
must be a LOT of issues to take a team from being 1 out from winning the ACC Championship to a 4-24 record
[QUOTE="ThePanthers, post: 2646.
Your right it couldn’t be Hermaneks fault after all she came to Pitt with a .500 winning percentage in the summit league and the Mac combined. Maybe try running something other than a “b” level travel team softball practice and having a game plan adequately prepared for the players from game to game to give them a chance to succeed. No one with any softball smarts that knew the situation going in would have expected this team to repeat its success from last season and even then that team had its ups and downs. At Pitt you as a coach MUST be able to develope the players at your disposal walk ons included and play good fundamentally sound softball to be successful. That’s is why the previous staff had s
