Southern Illinoise University Athletics
No. 20 Softball travels to first place UNI this weekend
03/20/2009 | 12:00:00 | Softball
March 20, 2009
By Kyle Herm
www.SIUSalukis.com
CARBONDALE, Ill. -The 20th-ranked Saluki softball team (17-4, 2-1 MVC) ventures to Cedar Falls, Iowa this weekend for a three-game series against first place Northern Iowa (17-7, 3-0 MVC).
The series opens with a noon and 2 p.m. doubleheader on Saturday, followed by a single game on Sunday at 12 p.m.
Southern Illinois enters the second week of the conference season after having won two-out-of-three games last weekend at home against Drake.
The Panthers swept their MVC-opening series over Missouri State to sit tied with Creighton in first at 3-0. UNI also dropped a pair of non-league games to No. 10/11 Oklahoma and Oklahoma State during the week.
The Salukis took all three games from Northern Iowa last year at home and lead the all-time series 62-20. SIU has also won 22 straight games over UNI dating back to 2001.
The weekend match up will feature UNI's top-ranked Valley offense against SIU's top-ranked conference pitching.
The Panthers hold the best slugging percentage (.455), second-best batting average (.301) and have scored the most runs (141) and hit the most home runs (19) in the league.
However, the Salukis hold the best earned run average (1.43), allowed the fewest runs (39) and are allowing opponents to hit a mere .180.
All three games can be heard live online through Saluki All-Access with Patrick Erickson and Katie Louis delivering the play-by-play and color commentary.
