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2015 WCWS Championship Round -- Game 3

TOP 1st: Michigan goes quietly. BOTTOM 1st: An HBP and failed defensive attempt to get the lead runner on a bunt put Gators on first and second with none out. Lauren Haeger, starting again as UF pitcher, then singled in the game's first run. The next two batters are retired, but Taylor Schwarz singles in two more runs . 3-0 Florida after one. Interestingly, as shown below in my pregame stats, Schwarz is second in OPS for the Gators in the title round, although she had only three plate-appearances before tonight ... TOP 2nd: Michigan goes quietly again. BOTTOM 2nd: Lead-off hitter bunts for single, with overthrow to first putting runner on second... Things continue to go downhill for Michigan, as runner advanced to third with one out, and Kelsey Stewart singles her in. 4-0 Florida . I never thought I'd be saying this, but Megan Betsa in to pitch in relief of Haylie Wagner... Two straight HBP load bases for Taylore Fuller... Betsa strikes out Fuller and Kirsti Merritt, kee

2015 WCWS Championship Round -- Game 2

A little late getting home tonight, so I'm catching up. Michigan is the home team, with Haylie Wagner starting for the Maize and Blue, and Lauren Haeger for the Orange and Blue... Michigan scores in first inning, via singles by Sierra Lawrence and Kelsey Susalla, and 1-0 Wolverines remains the score... With Florida about to come up in the top of the fourth, ESPN announcers note that Wagner has thrown first-pitch strikes to 8 out of 11 Gator batters thus far... A borderline hit (as opposed to an error by the shortstop) for Lauren Haeger, followed by a solid hit by Taylore Fuller give the Gators runners at first and second with one out in the top of the fourth... Nothing comes of it, though... Aubree Munro leads off the top of the fifth for Florida with a bloop single to shallow right... Justine McLean liner caught in air by shortstop, runner doubled off first... Kelsey Stewart flies to left, ending half-inning... Lawrence lines double to the wall with one out for Michigan

2015 WCWS Championship Round -- Game 1

A bit of a surprise in that Florida is starting Aleshia Ocasio, instead of Lauren Haeger, in the circle. Haeger is the ace, but Ocasio has beaten Michigan twice this season. The Wolverines are sticking with Megan Betsa, even though her pitching has been shaky in the two previous games and Haylie Wagner has had to relieve her. TOP 1st: Kelly Christner gets a two-out single for Michigan, but that's it... BOTTOM 1st: Errant throw on grounder to short puts Gators' Kelsie Stewart on second... Stewart to third on ground-out to second. That brings up Haeger, who has hit 70 career homers along with exceeding 70 pitching wins ... Haeger hits her 71st, making it 2-0 Gators ... Two strikeouts (with a walk in between) gets Betsa and Michigan out of the inning... TOP 2nd: Wagner gets two-out single... Tera Blanco walks, bringing up Abby Ramirez.  The Wolverines have been getting a lot of production from the lower part of the order in the WCWS... But not this time, as Ramirez strikes o

2015 WCWS Day 4

Auburn, having gone 10 innings to beat UCLA yesterday, is working overtime again, today vs. Florida. The Gators are coming up in the bottom of the ninth. The game was tied 2-2 after four innings and it has remained so ever since... A Gator win puts them in the championship series, which begins Monday night, as Auburn already has one loss and would be eliminated if it loses the current game. The Tigers would need to win the current game and beat Florida once more, to make the finals... UF's Nicole DeWitt singles to shallow left, driving in winning run from second with two outs... Gators to championship series! Michigan and LSU go scoreless in the first... LSU with a threat in the top of the second, with runners at the corners and one out... Sac-fly, almost to the track in center, brings home first run , 1-0 LSU ... Runner on first advances to second on wild pitch... Another wild one advances runner to third... HBP puts runners on corners again... Another shaky start for UM's

2015 WCWS Day 3 (Survival Saturday)

It's called "Survival Saturday," because every game features teams coming in with one loss and thus every game will eliminate someone. The only way to survive is to win. Today's first two games pit against each other teams that lost in Thursday's first round: Auburn vs. Tennessee, and Alabama vs. Oregon. The winners will then take on a team that lost in Friday's second round (LSU or UCLA). Here's a chart to help you follow the proceedings, with my live-blogging of the games below it... No Losses One Loss Two Losses (Gone) Florida Michigan Auburn Tennessee Tennessee Alabama Alabama Oregon Oregon LSU UCLA UCLA HTML Tables   Unless Tennessee gets something going, it will be the first team to pack its bags, as the Volunteers trail Auburn 4-1, with the Tigers batting in the top of the fifth... Vols cut deficit to 4-2 in bottom of fifth, but leave bases loaded ... 4-2 Auburn is how it ends ... As pointed out on Auburn's Twitter page , this is

2015 WCWS Day 2

FLORIDA - LSU : Tigers load the bases in the bottom of the first with no out, but can't get ball out of infield on next two at-bats, resulting in force play at home, and double-play (runner from second-to-third tagged out, batter thrown out at first)... Gator pitcher Lauren Haeger hits a two-run, milestone homer in the top of the fifth to break a scoreless tie... UF now leading 4-0 as LSU comes up in bottom of seventh... 4-0 is your final. UCLA - MICHIGAN : I'm always excited to see my undergraduate (UCLA) and graduate (Michigan) alma maters play each other! It's also a rematch of the epic 2005 final series , in which Michigan became the first school east of the Mississippi River to win the NCAA softball title... UCLA loads the bases with none out in the bottom of the first... 1-0 Bruins on a sharp single to left with one out... 2-0, as a two-out walk brings in a run... HBP makes it 3-0 Bruins , still bottom of the first... Haylie Wagner coming in to pitch for Megan

2015 WCWS Day 1

TENNESSEE - FLORIDA : Gator pitcher Lauren Haeger homers in bottom of the first , her 17th blast of the season, to make it 1-0... Vols avoid further damage, as UF leaves bases loaded... Gators again leave bases loaded in second... UF coming up in the bottom of the sixth, leading 5-2. As the score indicates, Haeger's long shutout-innings streak is over ... Final: Florida 7, Tennessee 2 . LSU - AUBURN :  The purple-and-gold is off to an early 1-0 lead on a Bianka Bell homer ... LSU leads 6-1 as Auburn bats in the bottom of the seventh... Auburn gets its first two batters on base; does it have another comeback a la  the super-regional opener vs. Louisiana-Lafayette in store? No. A double-play on a grounder to third and then a strikeout give LSU the easy win . ALABAMA - MICHIGAN : Kelly Christner homers in the bottom of the first to give the Wolverines a 1-0 lead... The Crimson Tide gets a single with one out in the top of the fourth, its first hit of the game... Lauren Sweet b

Growing SEC Presence in WCWS

When the 2015 NCAA Women's College World Series begins tomorrow, an inescapable fact will be the presence of five teams from the Southeastern Conference (SEC) within the eight-team field. In the following graph, I've depicted the number of teams the SEC and other major conferences have placed in the WCWS over the past 10 years, based on data from the Wikipedia . The expanding share of yellow represents SEC teams. And the trend is likely to get even more pronounced. The dashed-yellow slashes across some of the red (Big 12) blocks signify teams that were in the Big 12 at the time of their WCWS appearances, but have since moved to the SEC (Texas A&M and Missouri). The SEC's rise in softball started slow, but once begun, has been continuous. College softball came under the aegis of the NCAA in 1982, but it wasn't until 1997 that the SEC got a team (South Carolina) into the World Series. It's not that the SEC had a bunch of weak teams in the 1980s and '90s

2015 Super-Regional Tracker (Sunday)

Florida , leading one game to none in its series vs. Kentucky, also leads by a score of 1-0 , as the Wildcats come up in the bottom of the seventh for their last chance to prolong the series... Florida advances on the strength of pitcher Lauren Haeger's 29 straight scoreless innings in the tournament (as pointed out in an ESPN graphic)... Missouri began the bottom of the first with four straight singles, but only scored one run . UCLA has now taken over the game , leading 6-1 as the Tigers bat in the bottom of the third... Bruins come up in top of seventh, leading 10-5 after Mizzou leaves bases loaded... UCLA 10, Missouri 6 is your final from Los Angeles; Bruins on to 25th WCWS appearance... I'm sure I speak for everyone in the college-softball community in wishing Missouri pitcher Tori Finucane the best, after she was hit by a line-drive in what looked like the mouth area. Here is a posting from Mizzou's Twitter page... Update from Mizzou Twitter is cautiously

2015 Super-Regional Tracker (Saturday)

The three remaining series get underway today: Florida-Kentucky, LSU-Arizona, and UCLA-Missouri. As always, we have the tracker board below to indicate the status of each series... Florida has gone up 4-0 on Kentucky, with the Gators batting in the bottom of the second... Final: Florida 7-0. LSU has quickly taken its opener from Arizona, 8-0 in a five-inning run-rule contest . UCLA wins opener over Missouri, 7-4. Auburn and Louisiana-Lafayette are tied 2-2 in Game 2 of their series, with the Tigers batting in the top of the fifth... ULL's erratic performance in the circle continues; illegal pitches and a wild pitch help Auburn take 3-2 lead in top of the sixth... Tigers pulling away, 6-2 ... ULL has bases loaded with two outs in bottom of sixth... One run walked in, score now 6-3 ... Fly-out to center ends Cajun threat... No further scoring, as Auburn clinches school's first-ever appearance in WCWS . Alabama shuts out Oklahoma 2-0 to force a third game, which

2015 Super-Regionals Tracker (Friday)

Below is today's version of the tracker chart that I introduced yesterday. A wild one featuring Louisiana-Lafayette at Auburn is going to extra innings. The Ragin' Cajuns seemingly had this super-regional opener wrapped up, leading 10-5 with two outs in the bottom of the seventh, with Auburn having two runners on. However, four walks, a Tiger runner being awarded first base because a ULL relief pitcher exceeded the legal limit of warm-up pitches, and then another walk have tied the game 10-10 . Cajun pitchers weren't just walking batters; they weren't even coming close to home plate on most pitches. An Auburn hitter popped out to end the inning and I'm kind of shocked she swung at all... ULL regains the lead, 11-10 , in the top of the eighth on a wild pitch, with runners now at first and second with two outs... The Cajuns are retired with no further scoring... Auburn threatening in the bottom of the eighth with runners on first and second with no out. After a w

2015 Super-Regionals Tracker (Thursday)

The following chart will allow you to track the eight super-regional series, the two-out-of-three match-ups that will determine the participants in next week's Women's College World Series. Which super-regional series begin tonight, as opposed to Friday or Saturday? Which teams have captured one win on the road to the WCWS or have clinched a spot with two wins? It's all in the chart (or will be with my frequent updates)! Teams Game 1 Game 2 Game 3 Kentucky at Florida (1)***  NC State at Oregon (2)** Georgia (14) at Michigan (3)* Michigan LA-Lafayette (13) at Auburn (4)** Arizona (12) at LSU (5)*** Oklahoma (11) at Alabama (6)** Missouri (10) at UCLA (7)*** Florida State (9) at Tennessee (8)* Tennessee HTML Tables *Game 1 Thursday, Games 2 and (if necessary) 3 on Friday. **Game 1 Friday, Games 2 and (if necessary) 3 on Saturday.  ***Game 1 Saturday, Games 2 and (if necessary) 3 on Sunday.

Math Formulas for Predicting the Super-Regionals

For the first time, I'm going to apply some established sports-prediction formulas to the NCAA softball super-regionals, which begin Thursday. The starting point is what's called each team's "Pythagorean" season-long expected win percentage, based on its total runs scored and total runs allowed. The Pythagorean formula was originally developed for Major League Baseball, by Bill James, but has been modified for college softball by researchers at Fastpitch Analytics. As shown in the chart below, for example, Florida would have been expected to win roughly 85% of its regular-season games this past season, based on how many runs the Gators scored and allowed. The next step is to apply a formula known as "Log5," which gives the probability of one team beating another head-to-head , based on each team's Pythagorean value. The favored team and its Log5 win probability are shown in the last two columns of the following chart. Home Team Pytha

Reflections on the Just-Concluded Regionals (2015)

The results heavily followed the chalk this past weekend, as the top 14 seeded teams all won their respective regionals. Not advancing were the No. 15 (James Madison) and 16 (Notre Dame) seeds, which by definition are the weakest of the seeded teams. North Carolina State won the JMU-hosted regional, whereas Kentucky prevailed in South Bend. Interestingly, blogger Jon Nachtigal at Fastpitch Analytics wrote rather emphatically right after the 64-team field was announced on Selection Sunday that Kentucky should not have been awarded a bid . Now, Kentucky winning its regional does not necessarily mean that the committee made the proper selections with the information it had at the time . However, the Wildcats' win does seem to show the depth of the SEC, which has eight teams among the 16 in the super-regionals. Arguably the most exciting Sunday action was nowhere to be found on the ESPN Family of Networks, but only on live streaming video from the University of Arizona athletics w

2015 NCAA Regionals -- Who's Advanced, Who's Still Alive, Who's Been Eliminated

The following table shows the status of each regional. The "2-0" and "2-1" column headings reflect teams' records  entering  Sunday's play (with the exception of the Eugene, Oregon regional, which started a day earlier). Under the double-elimination format, the "2-1" team had to beat the "2-0" team twice on Sunday to advance.  Teams in bold (with game-article links) have advanced to the super-regionals. Region 2-0 2-1 Eliminated Eliminated Gainesville, FL Florida (1) Florida Atlantic Hofstra Florida A&M Eugene, OR Oregon (2) N. Dakota St. BYU Fresno St. Ann Arbor, MI Michigan (3) Pitt Cal Oakland U. Auburn, AL Auburn (4) S. Alabama Tennessee Tech Chattanooga Baton Rouge, LA Arizona St. LSU (5) Nebraska Texas Southern Tuscaloosa, AL Alabama (6) Washington SC-Upstate Fairfield Los Angeles, CA UCLA (7) San Diego St. Texas CS Northridge Knoxville, TN Tennessee (8) Utah Longwood Virginia Tech Tallahassee, FL Florida St. (9) UCF

2015 NCAA Regionals -- Saturday Updates

Not a good day so far for seeded (and unseeded) SEC teams. No. 5-seed LSU has fallen to Arizona State , 1-0. After starting off the season 25-0 and holding a 41-5 record as of April 19, the Tigers have stumbled, going 4-6 in their last 10 games before today's loss. Under the regionals' double-elimination format, LSU can still recover, but it won't be easy. No. 14-seed Georgia is locked in a marathon tussle with Western Kentucky, currently tied 1-1 in the 14th inning, the equivalent of two regulation-length games... ...and the Bulldogs have  just lost  to the Hilltoppers, 2-1. Another seed (this time non-SEC) has lost, as NC State shuts out No. 15-seed James Madison, 2-0. No. 11-seed Oklahoma narrowly escapes Texas A&M, 7-5, scoring three in the bottom of the seventh , including a walk-off two-run homer by Erin Miller.

Don't Trust NCAA Game Trackers! (Regional Update)

We all make mistakes, but some are larger than others. Take today's first game of the Tuscaloosa, Alabama regional between South Carolina-Upstate and Washington. The Game Tracker page on the NCAA softball website (left) tells us that USC-Upstate pulled a 4-1 upset over the 11-time Women's College World Series participant Huskies. In seeking further details on the game, I discovered that -- not so fast -- maybe Upstate didn't win. In fact, the Spartans' Twitter feed (right) says that Washington won 4-1 (my highlighting added). The Huskies' Twitter feed (not shown) also proclaims a U-Dub win, so I'm going to conclude the NCAA site is wrong. As I write, the erroneous score still has not been corrected. If you want to be confident in the accuracy of a score, I have one piece of advice: Independently verify! *** Here's an actual upset: No. 16 seed Notre Dame falls at home to Ball State, 6-3.