Newburgh, N.Y. – The Mount Saint Mary College Softball team begins its quest for its third straight conference title on Friday when it takes on the College of Mount Saint Vincent to open the 2018 Skyline Conference Championship. Live Stats and Video are available for those who cannot attend the 2:00 p.m. contest to be played at St. Joseph's-L.I.
At A Glance: The Knights enter the weekend at 17-14 overall and earned the top seed in the event with a 15-1 conference record. The Mount won its last three contests and five of its final six.
The Mount is hitting .309 as a team and features eight players hitting better than .300 heading into the weekend. Senior
Cindy Connoly (Walden, N.Y.) leads the Knights with a .379 batting average, including five doubles and a home run, to go along with 13 runs scored. Classmate
Taylor Canto (Walden, N.Y.) leads the Mount with three home runs and is hitting .321 and joins Connoly atop the team leaderboard with 22 RBI.
Morgan O'Neill (Little Falls, N.Y.) is hitting .316 in her freshman season with
Emily Lang (Westtown, N.Y.) checking in at .316 and is one of three Knights with three triples on the season.
Lauren Oury (Bethpage, N.Y.),
Kathryn Eiler (Merrick, N.Y.),
Amanda Almodovar (Goshen, N.Y.) and
Alyssa Hernandez (Middletown, N.Y.) round out the contingent hitting better than .300. Almodovoar leads the Knights with 30 runs scored and has gone 24-for-25 in stolen base chances.
Connoly leads the pitching staff again in her final season, holding a 10-8 record and a 2.33 earned run average heading into Friday. She has struck out 155 batters against just nine walks in 114.0 innings of work and is allowing opponent just a .238 batting average.
Bridget Bennett (Gardiner, N.Y.) has come on late to even her record at 6-6 on the season and has fanned 73 in 70.0 innings pitched.
A Look At The Dolphins: Mount Saint Vincent topped Old Westbury 1-0 in the First Round on Wednesday and begins the weekend at 17-16 overall.
Rachel Heizer leads both the offense and the pitching staff in 2018, hitting .430 with 27 RBI at the plate and winning 10 games with a 1.92 earned run average in the circle. Heizer has fanned 82 hitters to date in the circle and has scored 29 runs to go along with 15 walks at the plate.
Taylor Miliata holds the team lead in RBI with 28 to date and is hitting .363 with six home runs. Samantha Broo has stolen a team-high three bases and scored 20 runs with Katie Moos crossing with 22 runs scored to go along with 10 doubles.
Recent History: Since the start of the 2008 season, Mount Saint Mary and Mount Saint Vincent have met 23 times with the Knights scoring 19 wins. The Mount has won each of the eight meetings between the two sides, including a sweep in Newburgh in 2018. The two teams have met just once previously in the conference championship, with the Knights scoring a 4-1 in 2016 on their way to the first of back-to-back conference titles.
What's Next: The winner of Friday's contest will be back in action on Saturday at 11:00 on Saturday morning, while the loser will play at 1:00 p.m. Saturday afternoon in the weekend's first elimination game.
