Ohio State to Face Purdue Wednesday to Open Big Ten Tournament
5/9/2022 10:48:05 AM | Softball
2022 Season Stats // 2022 Schedule & Results // 2022 Roster // Tournament Bracket
COLUMBUS, Ohio – It’s tournament time, Big Ten style. The Ohio State softball team’s postseason begins on Wednesday afternoon when the sixth-seeded Buckeyes face 11th-seeded Purdue in the opening round of the Big Ten Tournament in East Lansing, Mich.
The game will air live on BTN. Live stats will also be available on the schedule page at OhioStateBuckeyes.com.
The Basics
Ohio State vs. Purdue // Wednesday, May 11 // Approx. 1:30 p.m. // East Lansing, Mich.
Watch Live: BTN // Live Stats // Twitter Updates // Tournament Central
Briefly on the Buckeyes
- Ohio State finished its regular season with a 33-14 overall record and 13-9 mark in Big Ten Conference play.
- The Buckeyes won four of their last five games, including a doubleheader sweep of Maryland on Sunday in College Park by scores of 6-0 and 8-5, respectively.
- Ohio State has six everyday starters who bat over .300: Sam Hackenbracht (.380), Niki Carver (.357), Melina Wilkison (.328), Jaycee Ruberti (.310) and Kami Kortokrax (.305).
- The Buckeyes also possess good power numbers, as they finished the regular season fifth in the conference in slugging percentage (.468) with 61 doubles, 45 home runs and 11 triples.
- The tandem of Carver (10) and Hackenbracht (14) have 24 of the Buckeyes’ 45 home runs. Hackenbracht’s 14 home runs were fifth-highest in the league.
- Pitcher Lexie Handley is 20-8 on the season with a 2.58 ERA in 192.2 innings pitched. On Sunday, she set Ohio State’s single-season strikeouts record and enters the Big Ten Tournament with 243 Ks.
- After Handley, sophomores Emily Ruck (54.1 innings) and Allison Smith (64.2 innings) have handled the duties in the circle.
- Ruck is 5-2 on the season while Smith, who was the winning pitcher in the second game of last Sunday’s doubleheader, is 8-4.
- Head coach Kelly Kovach Schoenly is in her 10th season leading the Buckeyes. She has a 300-185-1 (.618) record in Columbus and a 488-337-2 mark overall including her six seasons at Miami (Ohio).
Sizing Up the Big Ten Tournament
- The winner of Wednesday’s opening-round game between Ohio State and Purdue will play third-seeded Illinois on Thursday at approximately 1:30 p.m.
- The Buckeyes didn’t face either Purdue or Illinois during the regular season.
- The tournament semifinals are slated on Friday afternoon with the championship game coming on Saturday, May 14, at 2 p.m.
- All 11 games will be broadcast live on BTN.
Scouting Purdue
- The Boilermakers finished the regular season 24-30 overall and 7-15 in Big Ten play. They concluded the regular season by taking two of three games at Iowa last weekend.
- Purdue did pick up back to back series wins over Rutgers and Iowa to finish the regular season and enter the tournament with a 4-2 record in its last six games.
- Rachel Becker was the Big Ten’s regular season batting champion, finishing with a .434 average with 43 runs scored and 15 doubles.
- Alex Echazarreta led the team in total innings pitched (101.1) and averaged just over a strikeout per inning (107 Ks in 101.1 innings).
Buckeye This and That
- Niki Carver not only had a career year – she increased her batting average by over 80 points from last season – but she was at her best against Big Ten competition.
- In 22 Big Ten games, Carver hit .415 with four home runs, 16 RBI and a .581 on-base percentage.
- That on-base includes seven walks and 14 hit by pitches.
- Sam Hackenbracht led the team in RBI in conference games, driving in 20 runs in 22 games with a .375 average and .611 slugging percentage.
- Lexie Handley broke Ohio State’s single-season strikeout record that has previously stood for 15 years, since Jamee Juarez set it in 2007 (240).
- Handley also became Ohio State’s first 20-game winner since Kim Reeder won 21 in 2009. The single-season wins record is also held by Reeder, who won 26 games in 2008.
- Ohio State played series’ this regular season against four of the conference’s top five seeds. It won five games had had series wins over second-seeded Nebraska and fifth-seeded Maryland.
- The Buckeyes finished the regular season with a 27-8 record in road/neural games. Ohio State was 13-5 in true road games – including 8-3 in the Big Ten – and 14-3 in neutral games.
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