Missouri State Softball - Games 43-45
 

Missouri State (22-20, 10-11 MVC) vs. Drake Bulldogs (23-25, 6-15 MVC) - Alumni Weekend
Dates	Friday, April 28 (Doubleheader} | Saturday, April 29
Times	Friday 2 p.m. (DH) | Saturday, 11 a.m. | Central Time
Location	Killian Stadium (1,200), Springfield, Mo.
Live Stats	Live Stats
Follow Along	ESPN3 (Game 1)  |  ESPN3 (Game 2) | ESPN3 (Game 3) | @MSUSoftball
Missouri State	Game Notes | Softball Home Page | Twitter | Facebook | Media Guide
Up Next	MSU at Southern Illinois, May 6-7, Carbondale, Ill.

The Starting Lineup

• MSU will recognize its four seniors -- Elena Gambill, Olivia Roark, Mary Stephens, and Bethany Sullinger -- between games on Friday.
• MSU head coach Holly Hesse is just two wins shy of reaching 750 for her career. Starting the 2017 season, only 33 active Division I coaches had reached 750 career victories. Hesse is in her 29th season as MSU head coach and is the second-winningest coach in MVC history behind Illinois State's Melinda Fischer.
• Missouri State, which is 5-5 at home this season, is looking for its third winning campaign at Killian Stadium in the facility's nine-year history. MSU was 14-9 at home in 2011 and 12-7 at Killian in 2015. The Bears have also eclipsed 20,000 in all-time attendance at Killian this season.
• Mary Stephens (Sr., Sachse, Texas) is coming off her 200th career game on Tuesday. Stephens has 19 career home runs and is tied with Michelle Armentrout (2005-08) for the No. 4 spot on the club's career RBI list with 100. The team's all-time top three RBI leaders are: Heather Anderson (1994-98) with 125; Toni Rieke (1993-96) with 121; and Jessie Smith (2006-08) 105.
• Erika Velasquez Zimmer (Jr., Coppell, Texas) has hit safely in 10 straight games, the club's longest active hitting streak. Her 13-game streak earlier this season matched a career best and was the club's second-best hitting streak over the last 12 seasons.
• Kaitlin Beason (Jr., Webb City, Mo.) ranks 11th nationally with an MVC-best eight shutouts on the season. She is 12-9 with a 2.24 ERA. Beason also has 98 career strikeouts.
• MSU's top career hitters against Drake are: Bethany Sullinger .429 (9/21, 3-2B, HR, 5 RBI); Mary Stephens .241 (7/29, HR); and Erika Velasquez Zimmer .211 (4/19, 2B).
• Hailee Vigneaux (Jr., Ozark, Mo.) enters the weekend with 98 career hits. She is a .282 career hitter in 136 games.
• The Bears' defense continues its national prominence, ranking 38th nationally (2nd in MVC) in double plays per game (0.43) and 45th nationally (2nd in MVC) in fielding percentage (.969). Mary Stephens is second in the MVC in double plays with 16.
• Elena Gambill (Sr., Broken Arrow, Okla.) has reached base safely in 11 straight games headed into the weekend series. In addition to Erika Velasquez Zimmer's (Jr., Coppell, Texas) 10-game streak, Darian Frost (So., Lee's Summit, Mo.) has reached base in 9 straight games.
• Over the last six games, Bethany Sullinger (Sr., Kansas City, Mo.) is hitting .476 with a double, two home runs and an .810 slugging percentage. Her 17 total bases in that span is equal to the team's next-best players -- Elena Gambill (9) and Darian Frost (8) -- combined. Gambill is hitting .400 and Frost is hitting .375 in that span.
  MSU's four seniors -- Gambill, Olivia Roark, Stephens and Sullinger -- have combined for 690 games and 456 hits.

Head Coach Holly Hesse
   Holly Hesse (Creighton, 1982) is 748-742-2 (.502) in her 29th season as head coach at Missouri State and overall. She is 38-45-1 all-time against Drake.
   She the second-winningest coach in Missouri Valley Conference history and joined the 700-victory club with a 4-0 win at Illinois State on April 18, 2015 as part of a doubleheader sweep in Normal.
   She is also the winningest softball coach in Missouri State history. Her tenure includes two regular-season MVC titles, five MVC tournament crowns and five NCAA Tournament appearances. Hesse recorded her 300th win in 2000, her 400th win in 2004, her 500th in 2007 and victory number 600 in 2012.  Missouri State leads all schools with 70 wins in the MVC Tournament and Hesse has the second-most MVC Tournament wins with 49. Hesse started the 2017 campaign ranked 36th among all active NCAA Division I coaches with 726 career victories.
   Hesse's 2016 squad finished ranked 13th in the country with a .973 fielding percentage. The Bears went 22-30 and earned a spot in the MVC Tournament in a do-or-die series to end the regular season.  Her team rallied to the challenge and carried the momentum to the MVC Tournament quarterfinals.
 
The Series
   Drake holds a one-game lead, 48-47-1, all-time against Missouri State in a series that dates back to 1979. The Bears are 4-6 against the Bulldogs in the last 10 meetings, 12-20-1 all-time at home and 2-4 at Killian Stadium against DU.
   Missouri State earned a big series win last year in Des Moines after falling in the opening contest, 6-1, in the three-game series. The Bears battled back to win game two, 2-0, and edged out the Bulldogs, 2-1, in game three. Bethany Sullinger drove in the game-winning run in series finale, totaling two hits on the day.
 
Scouting the Opponent
   Drake enters Friday's doubleheader with a 23-25 overall record and 6-15 mark in MVC play. The Bulldogs have taken on three ranked opponents this season, falling to Arizona, Alabama and Louisiana-Lafayette. Ranked ninth in the conference offensively, the Bulldogs combine for a .245 team batting average.
   Mandi Roemmich leads the squad with a .372 batting average, racking up a team-high 42 hits and 10 doubles. As a team, Drake has 23 homers and leads the MVC with 70 stolen bases. In the circle, Kailee Smith leads the Drake pitching staff with a 14-16 record. The hurler boasts 175.0 innings pitched while Nicole Newman has a team-high 94 strikeouts and a league-best 1.27 ERA.
   The Bulldogs are led by 15th-year head coach Rich Calvert who is the all-time winningest coach in program history.