Southern Illinoise University Athletics
Scoggins, Garza named First-Team All-MVC
05/09/2007 | 12:00:00 | Softball
May 9, 2007
By Matt Crouch
www.SIUSalukis.com
NORMAL, Ill. - Senior pitcher Cassidy Scoggins became just the fifth Southern Illinois softball player to earn first-team All-Missouri Valley Conference honors three times as the Valley announced its annual awards Wednesday night at the MVC Tournament Banquet.
Games 52 - 54 Game Notes (MVC Tournament)
Freshman Alicia Garza joins Scoggins on the All-Valley first team while junior Tiffanie Dismore and sophomore Jayme Wamsley were named to the second team.
Illinois State's Kara Nelson earned MVC Player of the Year honors while Creighton's Tara Oltman was named MVC Pitcher of the Year and Newcomer of the Year.
Illinois State, Creighton and SIU accounted for 15 of the 21 all-conference honorees with the Redbirds leading the way with six.
The Bluejays coaching staff of Brent Vigness, Jessica Draemel and Abby Johnson was named MVC Coaching Staff of the Year.
Scoggins, a three-time All-MVC honoree and 2006 MVC Pitcher of the Year, has a 20-8 record with a 1.79 ERA. She has 198 strikeouts in 199.1 innings this season with a .196 opponent batting average. The senior from Owasso, Okla. has also tallied seven solo shut outs with two no-hitters.
Garza, a freshman from Lafayette, Ind., leads the Salukis with a .363 (58-for-160) batting average. She has 13 doubles, two triples and five home runs along with 32 RBI. She has a .563 slugging percentage while drawing 19 walks for a .437 on-base percentage, stealing six bases along the way.
Garza has also done the job on the field, recording only three errors while playing second base for a .981 fielding percentage.
Dismore, a junior from Lafayette, Ind., has a .297 (52-for-175) batting average with eight doubles, two triples and two home runs. She also has 19 RBI and is a perfect seven-for-seven in stolen bases.
Wamsley, a sophomore from Hermitage, Tenn., rounds out SIU's all-conference honorees. She has a .314 (44-for-140) average with nine doubles and 10 home runs for a .593 slugging percentage. She has 39 RBI and has drawn nine walks for a .358 on-base percentage while playing error-free behind the plate for the Salukis.
The 2007 State Farm/MVC Tournament is set to kick off at 11 a.m. on Thursday, May 10 with #5 Evansville taking on #8 Indiana State. The winner of that game will play in the quarterfinals against #4 Wichita State at 4 p.m.
In the bottom half of the bracket, #6 Missouri State is set to take on #7 Bradley at 1:30 p.m. with the winner taking on #3 SIU at 6:30 p.m.
All games are scheduled to be played at ISU's Redbird Softball Complex.
Fans wanting to follow the action live in this week's MVC Softball Tournament can follow the play-by-play with GameTracker. The free service can be accessed by going to the softball schedule page on SIUSalukis.com.
A free audio Webcast with Patrick Erickson and Katie Louis is also available by clicking the Listen Live! link on SIUSalukis.com.
Fans can also watch all the action, with the exception of the championship game, by subscribing to MVC TV ($9.95 for the tournament) by going to www.MVC-Sports.com.
For the fourth year in a row, the MVC Championship game will be broadcast live on Fox College Sports, Metrosports and Comcast at 1:30 p.m. on Saturday, May 12. A tape-delayed broadcast is scheduled to run on Fox Sports Midwest.
For more information on the 2007 State Farm / Missouri Valley Conference Tournament, go to the Tournament Central Web site.
2007 Missouri Valley Conference Softball All-Conference Team
First Team
P - Tara Oltman, Creighton
P - Cassidy Scoggins, Southern Illinois
C - T.J. Eadus, Creighton
1B - Amber Smith, Illinois State
2B - Alicia Garza, Southern Illinois
3B - Kara Nelson, Illinois State
SS - Britnee Barnett, Wichita State
OF - Jessie Buker, Illinois State
OF - Kelsey Warning, Illinois State
OF - Laura Rather, Evansville
At-Large - Jamie Reiss, Creighton
At-Large - Stacy Birk, Illinois State
At-Large - Margo Pruis, Wichita State
At-Large - Brittany Herald, Evansville
At-Large - Shannon Nicholson, Illinois State
Second-Team
Jayme Wamsley, Southern Illinois
Michelle Koch, Creighton
Katie Martin, Missouri State
Meredith Simpson, Indiana State
Katie McGeeney, Wichita State
Tiffanie Dismore, Southern Illinois
Caitlin Marcano, Creighton
Player of the Year - Kara Nelson, Illinois State
Pitcher of the Year - Tara Oltman, Creighton
Newcomer of the Year - Tara Oltman, Creighton
Coaching Staff of the Year - Creighton (Brent Vigness, Jessica Draemel, Abby Johnson)
