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Missouri State

Daphne Plummer

Softball Bears Kick Off 10-Game Road Trip at Bradley

April 01, 2021

By: MSU Athletics Communications
Missouri State Bears (26-10, 7-1 MVC) at Bradley Braves (9-10, 2-4 MVC)
Dates Friday, April 2 – Saturday April 3, 2021
Site | Location Petersen Hotels Field | Peoria, Ill.
Game 1 Friday, 1:00 p.m. | Live Stats | | Watch (ESPN3) | MSU Game Notes
Game 2 Friday, 30 mins. after Game 1 | Live Stats | | Watch (ESPN3) | MSU Game Notes
Game 3 Saturday, 11:00 a.m. | Live Stats | Watch (ESPN3) | MSU Game Notes
Missouri State Softball Home Page | Season Stats | Roster | Twitter | Facebook
Up Next April 6 | at Arkansas | Fayetteville, Ark.

The Prime Nine
  • Missouri State (16-10, 7-1 MVC) gets back into Missouri Valley Conference play with a Friday-Saturday series at Bradley (9-10, 2-4 MVC) to begin a 10-game road slate. The Bears fell to Kansas City, 8-3 on Tuesday (March 30) in Springfield as the midway point of a seven-games-in-seven-days stretch for MSU. Daphne Plummer and Bailey Greenlee each recorded their first career home runs with Plummer's solo shot leading off the Bears' opening frame and Greenlee following suit in the seventh after a five-run inning from the 'Roos in the top half led the visitors to take the non-conference bout.
  • With a league-best seven wins, the Bears are off to their best start (7-1) in conference play since the 2006 team rattled off 10 straight wins to begin their league campaign. The triumphs have come against opponents who were predicted to be among the top tier in the MVC with all three challengers - UNI (4th), SIU (1st) and Drake (5th) - landing in the top-5 of the Valley preseason poll. Missouri State was picked to finish third, according to the league poll.
  • MSU scored a season-high 14 runs against Drake on Sunday to extend a hot-hitting stretch for the Bears who are outscoring league opponents by a 43-21 margin. MSU has scored four or more runs in seven of its last eight games with Tess Weakly leading the power surge with her eight RBI during that span.
  • The Bears rank fourth in the league in extra-base hits, racking up a total of 47 with 24 doubles, seven triples and 16 home runs. The seven triples are a league-best with five of them coming in a four-game span (Feb. 26-March 5). Plummer's triple-bagger against Drake on Sunday was her second of the season and the sixth of her career after recording two in 2018 and 2019.
  • In MSU's five-game sweep of SIU and Drake last week, Tess Weakly (So., Elsberry, Mo.) hit .400 (6-15), tallied a team high seven RBI, smacked two home runs and added a double to finish with a .867 slugging percentage. Weakly launched a leadoff solo shot in the second inning in MSU's 4-0 win over the Salukis before going on to belt her second homer of the week in game one against Drake. She closed out her week with her seventh extra-base hit of the season on an RBI-double in the series finale.
  • Steffany Dickerson (Sr., Oklahoma City, Okla.) and Madison Hunsaker (Sr., Peculiar, Mo.) combined for all five wins last week. Dickerson began the week in stellar fashion with a shutout performance against SIU on March 24, blanking a Salukis squad that leads the league in runs scored. She went on to add another complete-game effort in MSU's 5-4 win against Drake on March 27 before picking up her third win of the week in the series finale. Hunsaker posted a 0.88 ERA in her three appearances which included two complete-game outings where she allowed just two earned runs and struck out nine. Along with Gracie Johnston (So., Augusta, Kan.), the MSU pitching trio has posted five shutouts in 2021 which ranks second most in the conference. All three of them have each made 14 appearances this season.
  • Kelly Metter (Sr., Columbia, Ill.) recorded her third three-hit performance of the season on March 28 versus Drake. Metter is hitting .293 on the year and added her third home run of the season in Saturday's 5-4 win over the Bulldogs.
  • Leadoff hitter Daphne Plummer (Sr., Lee's Summit, Mo.) paces the MSU lineup with a .324 batting average and a team-high 26 hits. She is coming off a 3-4 performance against the 'Roos, highlighted by her first career home run. As a four-year player for coach Holly Hesse, Plummer has made 145 career starts.
  • Darian Frost (Sr., Lee's Summitt, Mo.) added two more doubles to her 2021 ledger against Drake last weekend to give the senior catcher 26 extra-base hits for her career. In league games, Frost's four doubles ranks first among Valley hitters.
Head Coach Holly Hesse
  • Bears head coach Holly Hesse is in her 33rd season leading the Bears' program as the second-winningest coach in Missouri Valley Conference history with a career record of 834-810-2 (.507). She began the year ranked 30th among all active NCAA Division I coaches in career victories.
  • Coach Hesse is 56-29 vs. Bradley in her career.
  • Hesse joined the elite 800-win club on March 24, 2019 with the Bears' 3-2 come-from-behind win over Northern Iowa at Killian Stadium to make her the 30th active Division I coach at the time with 800 wins at the time. Hesse picked up her 750th win on Feb. 9, 2018 with a 4-0 win over Mississippi Valley State at the Bulldog Kickoff Classic in Starkville, Miss., after earning her 700th victory with a 4-0 win at Illinois State on April 18, 2015, completing a doubleheader sweep in Normal, Ill.
  • She is the winningest coach in Missouri State history, and her tenure includes two regular-season MVC titles, five MVC tournament crowns and five NCAA Tournament appearances.
  • The most notable program wins under Hesse have come against Michigan (1996), Alabama (2006) and Oklahoma (1995, 1998, 1999, 2008) all of which have gone on to win NCAA DI National Championships. In 2019, Hesse led the Bears to a 4-3 win at No. 16 Auburn.
  • Hesse has coached 36 different first-team all-conference players which have received 51 first-team all-conference honors.  Twenty-three of Hesse's players have gone on to earn NFCA All-Midwest Region honors, including Steffany Dickerson in 2019.
  • Recent statewide honors for Hesse include induction into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 2018 and the Missouri State University Staff Excellence in Public Affairs Award, presented to her in 2016 by the MSU Board of Governors for distinctive work and accomplishments in support of Missouri State's public affairs mission.
Series History
  • Missouri State leads the all-time series against Bradley, 62-35, in a rivalry that started in 1983. The Bears are 25-17 all-time in Peoria against the Braves and have won the regular-season series each of the last three seasons and four of the last five seasons of conference play.
  • In 2019, MSU took two of three in Peoria with a doubleheader sweep highlighting the trip. Steffany Dickerson tossed a complete-game effort and Daphne Plummer's three-run triple pushed the Bears to a 4-3 victory in game one. Erin Griesbauer added another quality start from the MSU pitching circle and a run-scoring triple from Kyana Mason and Plummer's fourth RBI of the day clinched the series win on a 3-2 result. Bradley bounced back in the finale to stifle the Bears in a 2-0 win and avoid the series sweep
 
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