Teams: Softball: Press Releases

Tuesday, May 9, 2006

SOFTBALL AWARDED EIGHTH NCAA TOURNAMENT BERTH

MEDFORD -- The Tufts University softball team will make its eighth appearance in the NCAA Division III Tournament beginning on Thursday (May 11) in Camden, New Jersey. After a two-year hiatus from the NCAAs, the Jumbos return as one of 59 teams selected to the tournament field.

Tufts, which received an at-large berth after losing in the NESCAC Tournament championship game against Williams on Sunday, was sent out of region to Rutgers University Camden for the NCAA Regionals. The Jumbos (26-14) are seeded third in the seven-team tournament and will play six-seed Wilkes University (26-13) in the first round on Thursday at 12:30 pm. The Lady Colonels earned an automatic berth by claiming the Freedom Conference title. They are making their fourth NCAA appearance and their first since 1999.

Other first-day games on Thursday include four-seed Pitt-Bradford (34-7) vs. five-seed Manhattanville (29-12) at 10 am, two-seed Rowan (38-5) vs. seven-seed Hunter (17-16) at 3 pm, and host Rutgers-Camden (40-5) vs. the Pitt-Bradford and Manhattanville winner at 5:30 pm. The regional continues through Sunday. The champion will move on to the NCAA finals, hosted by Peace College May 19-23 at the Walnut Creek Softball Complex in Raleigh, North Carolina.

The Jumbos are ranked 20^th nationally under third-year coach Cheryl Milligan. With a 20-person roster featuring 13 freshmen and sophomores, Tufts had growing pains during their spring break trip to the Sun West Tournament in California. The team returned home with a 4-8 record, but closed the week with a good 2-1 loss to national power Chapman University.

Tufts emerged as the top team in New England during the regular season. They won their first eight games back home, including sweeps of NCAA qualifiers Williams and Bridgewater State. After a split with Babson, another NCAA Tournament participant, Tufts won eight in a row again before splitting a pair with Endicott, yet another NCAA team on the 2006 Jumbo schedule. In all, the Jumbos went 20-4 during their New England regular-season. They won their fourth NESCAC East Division title, and second under Coach Milligan, with a 7-1 mark.

They did not meet with equal success in the NESCAC Tournament, hosted by West Division Champion Williams College. After defeating Amherst in the first round, the Jumbos lost to the host Ephs 1-0 in the second round. Tufts advanced to the championship game with a 13-8 come-from-behind victory over Trinity College, but lost to the Ephs in the final 6-5.

Milligan's last two recruiting classes lead the Jumbos offensively. The team is first in NESCAC with a .318 batting average, hit 22 home runs and was successful on 45 of 50 stolen base attempts. Sophomore 2B Danielle Lopez (Danvers, MA/Danvers) was a freshman All-American and is hitting .392 with 11 home runs this season. Her 41 runs scored, 47 runs batted in and 94 total bases are Tufts single-season records. Sophomore catcher Megan Cusick (Albany, NY/Albany), who picked off 12 base-runners this spring, is hitting .333 with seven doubles and 16 RBIs. Erica Bailey (Scottsdale, AZ/Chaparral) is also hitting .333 with two home runs and 21 RBIs. Sophomores Heather Kleinberger (New City, NY/Clarkstown) and Mara Dodson (Roswell, GA/Roswell) are also Jumbo regulars.

The freshman class has been very productive at the plate. Infielder Samantha Kuhles (Somerville, NJ/Rutgers Prep) enters the tournament at .380 with 23 runs scored. Cara Hovhanessian (Farmington, CT/Farmington) has batted clean-up primarily and is at .351 with two home runs and 32 RBIs, placing her second behind Lopez in the league. Slap-hitters Laura Chapman (Seattle, WA/Bush School) and Alison Drobiarz (Old Saybrook, CT)/Old Saybrook) have added speed to the Tufts line-up, a dimension largely absent from the team's arsenal in its 22-year history. Maya Ripecky (Chicago, IL/Northside) has also been a bright spot at .317 with two home runs. Shortstop Meghan Foley (Worcester, MA/Holy Name) and speedster Roni Herbst (Montclair, NJ/Montclair) have also made key contributions.

Senior co-captain Jess Barrett (Milford, MA/Milford) has had a career year hitting .310, and junior Annie Ross (Newton, MA/Newton South) is a solid veteran in center field who is second on the team with 24 runs scored.

The Jumbos have a reliable rotation of four in the pitcher's circle. Senior co-captain Sarah Conroy (Biddeford, ME/Biddeford) led the Jumbos with 17 starts and is 8-4 with a 2.65 earned run average, 42 strikeouts and a .219 batting average against. Bailey can be the most dominating, striking out 53 in 62 innings and recording a 2.94 era. Senior Julia Brenta (San Anselmo, CA/Redwood) enters the tournament at 7-2 with a 2.95 era and Lauren Gelmetti (Westfield, NJ/Westfield), the lone freshman on the pitching staff, is also 7-2 with a 1.99 era and two shutouts.

The Jumbos have been solid in the field, leading NESCAC with a .954 fielding percentage. Lopez has a .969 mark at second base, Kuhles is at .954 primarily at third and Ross has not committed an error in center.

Tufts' best run in the NCAA Tournament came in 2000 when they won the New England regional and advanced to the national round in Salem, Virginia. The Jumbos are 11-14 overall in their previous seven NCAA appearances. They won three games in 2000 and three games in 2001. They have won once and last twice in the other five years.

Camden, New Jersey, close to Philadelphia, is close to where Coach Milligan grew up in Lansdale, Pennsylvania. She attended North Penn High School in Lansdale and came to Tufts in 1991. She started at shortstop for the Jumbos and was an assistant coach for six years before she was promoted to head coach in 2004.

Thirty-five conferences overall were granted automatic qualification and six independents were selected for the 2006 championship. The 18 remaining teams were selected on an at-large basis from automatic qualifying conferences and the remaining independent institutions.

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