MAGNOLIA, Ark. - Ninth-year head coach Jason Anderson's Southern Arkansas Muleriders find themselves in a very familiar spot as the second weekend of May nears: the NCAA postseason. The Central Region's No. 6 seed gears up for its seventh consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance and eighth overall as the defending national champions in No. 3 seed Rogers State await in Thursday's opening round from Joplin, Missouri. First pitch is scheduled for 4:30 p.m. Live coverage of the tournament action can be found here: 2023 NCAA Central Regional Tournament (mssulions.com)
The Muleriders (41-13) finished the Great American Conference Tournament as runner-up for the second-consecutive season and grabbed an at-large bid into the NCAA postseason.
SAU prepares to face the Hillcats for the second time this season. RSU, then the No. 1 ranked team in the country, slipped by the Muleriders 3-2 in Edmond, Oklahoma on February 18. SAU is 4-3 all-time against Rogers State.
RBI singles from Kamryn Moctezuma and Ariana Rolle put SAU up 2-0 through five, but RSU struck for three runs in the sixth and would hold on for the eventual win.
The next day, the Muleriders suffered a 6-2 loss to Central Region 2 host Missouri Southern in Oklahoma City. It was the first meeting between the two programs since 2018 and the 11th overall.
Moctezuma homered in the third inning to open scoring against the Lions, but MSSU struck for four fourth-inning runs and added single tallies in the fifth and seventh innings as SAU used four pitchers in the contest.
Should they meet in the Show Me State, an SAU-Minnesota Duluth contest would mark the fourth meeting ever between the two programs; all of which will have taken place in the postseason. SAU won two over the Bulldogs in the 2018 Magnolia super regional on its way to the DII World Series and then stopped UMD 3-1 in the 2019 Edmond regional.
Southern Arkansas enters NCAA play hitting .318 as a team and is averaging 5.6 runs per game. In the circle, the Muleriders carry a team ERA of 2.53, while allowing 2.8 runs per game.
The Muleriders own the highest batting average of the four teams that will be playing in Joplin. NFCA All-Central Region second team outfielder Ariana Rolle leads with a .391 average. Alyssa Miller's 67 hits pace the team and Rolle follows with 66. Jaxynn Dyson's 37 RBI lead three other players with 30 or more. Her 40 runs scored are two more than both Rolle and Miller.
Dyson, Moctezuma and Gracie King have all hit nine home runs. Regan Dillon and Emily Shipman each follow with seven. Shipman leads in doubles with 15, Dyson follows with 13 and Courtney Storey has added a dozen.
Sydney Ward has won 21 of SAU's 41 games behind a 2.23 ERA in 169.2 innings pitched. She has totaled 145 strikeouts. Baylie Thornhill is 15-3 with four saves in 120.2 innings pitched. She has totaled 109 strikeouts.
SAU holds top 30 marks nationally in fielding percentage (15th - .974), home runs (26th - 52) and slugging percentage (29th - .500).
