Contact: Tyler Friel, Sports Information Graduate Assistant, 630-637-5302

May 3, 2017 – For the fifth straight year, the North Central College softball team will compete in the College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin (CCIW) postseason tournament, after claiming the fourth seed Tuesday afternoon with their doubleheader split against Augustana College.

It would come down to the final series of the season to determine who the final CCIW tournament qualifier would be after Millikin University, Carthage College and Illinois Wesleyan University had already claimed three of the four spots. With just one win need to knock Elmhurst College out of contention for the postseason, the Cardinals would take everything they could handle from the Augustana College Vikings.

After taking a 5-1 lead courtesy of a Taylor Clugston grand slam, the Cardinals would be locked in a 5-5 tie, taking nine innings to complete. With the bases loaded and one out, Jenna Trojniar singled up the middle, walking off a 6-5 victory and into the conference tourney.

The Cardinals will be the four seed, traveling to Decatur to take on the regular season champions and one seed Millikin University (30-10, 14-2). Millikin claimed their fifth regular season championship and first since 2011. Carthage (24-16, 12-4) is the second seed and will take on Illinois Wesleyan (28-12, 11-5), the third seed. This season, North Central finished the year 20-18 and 9-7 in conference. The Cardinals were swept by Millikin and Carthage but swept Illinois Wesleyan.

The Cardinals finished the season with the third best team batting average (.307) in conference and fifth in team ERA (2.85). The Cardinals Achilles heel has been their fielding, having the lowest fielding percentage of the four remaining teams as well as the most amount of errors of the four.

Offensively, North Central is led by Taylor Clugston who is batting .397 on the season, good for fourth in conference. She leads the team in hits (54), runs (35) and total bases (71). She also has 12 stolen bases this year, fifth in conference. Samantha Phelps and Brooke Kehoe lead the team in home runs with three on the year.

In the circle, Jennifer Yager leads the team in ERA with a 2.52 posting. Sarah Esposito finished with a 2.73 ERA and Jessica Weaver holds a 2.88 ERA. Yager is 6-8, Esposito is 5-3 and Weaver is 9-7.

The Cardinals will play at 2 pm on Friday, May 5 against Millikin. If they win they will play the winner of Carthage and Illinois Wesleyan at 6 pm. If they lose, it would be the loser of the Lady Reds and Titans at 4 pm. Live stats and video can be found HERE.