LSC Roundup 3-13

Basketball News
NCAA Division II South Central Region Women's Basketball Tournament
Good look at the first round matchups (excluding the WT-ACU game).

ACU gets another crack at No. 1 WT in regional tourney
A few days after a stunning loss in the first round of the Lone Star Conference women's basketball tournament, Abilene Christian senior Audrey Maxwell-Lively found herself back on the court, practicing for a game that might never come. In fact, as far as she knew, her collegiate career already was over.

Lady Buffs seek redemption in regional
West Texas A&M's Lady Buffs and Abilene Christian's Wildcats are meeting for the 56th time at 8 tonight in the NCAA Division II South Central Region tournament quarterfinals at the First United Bank Center.

In their long history, the teams have met only once previously in a regional. That was 13 years ago in the championship game of the tournament that ACU won en route to its only Elite Eight appearance.

Gholson: In The Nick of Time (March 13)
All of his life Marcus Anderson has had people telling him what he couldn’t do.

In the fifth grade, he was kicked off his YMCA basketball team.

“They told me I wasn’t good enough,” he said.

Football News
Javelinas football practice comes to rainy end
KINGSVILLE — Mother Nature snuffed Texas A&M-Kingsville’s scheduled intrasquad football scrimmage to close spring workouts on Thursday. Yet coach Bo Atterberry isn’t dismayed.

“I think it’s been a successful spring. Fortunately we had good weather other than today,” Atterberry said Thursday. “I don’t think there’s been any spring that I’ve ever gotten in all 15 practices. Unfortunately it just happens to be our last day.

“But we got a chance to go live quite a bit and evaluate the guys we needed to and see what the transfers could do, see the redshirts that hadn’t gotten any reps, for them to learn and do all those things,” he said. “We think it was a step in the right direction this past month.”

Baseball News
Hitting, pitching lead ACU
After a four-game sweep of West Texas A&M, No. 3 Abilene Christian was well-positioned in the Lone Star Conference with a 14-2 record.

After winning three nonconference encounters to push their record to 21-5, the Wildcats face a four-game series at East Central with doubleheaders Saturday and Sunday. Entering the week, Willie Uechi was leading ACU in batting average (. 447) and on-base percentage (. 500). The team was hitting a crisp .339. Pitchers Cameron Aspaas and Kevin Justice were a combined 9-1.

Javelinas Baseball Gameday
Coming off a 10-3 upset of 19th-ranked Incarnate Word on Tuesday, A&M-Kingsville snapped a two-game losing streak. 3B Travis Earles claimed co-LSC Player of the Week honors and leads the conference with a .468 batting average, and is batting .600 with runners in scoring position. Earles leads the Javs in batting, homers (three), RBI (24), slugging percentage (.696) and on-base percentage (.558). Six other Javs are hitting .300 or better. LHP Sam Strickland (5.59 ERA, 2-2) was named the LSC Pitcher of the Week. Freshman RHP Chris Brown is 2-2 with a 4.38 ERA.

Softball News
Javelinas Softball Gameday
Winners of five of its past six, A&M-Kingsville leads the South by 1.5 games over Abilene Christian and Angelo State. OF Cassie Anderson is on a 21-game hitting streak and leads the conference in batting at .539, 39 points ahead of the next-best hitter. She is on pace to set school records for batting average, slugging percentage, on-base percentage, hits, runs and total bases. P Courtney Rigamonti (15-3, 2.47 ERA, 95Ks) has topped her win total of 2008 (13) in less than half a season and leads the LSC in victories.

WT softball team to play A&M-Kingsville
The West Texas A&M softball team will take on Lone Star Conference South leader Texas A&M-Kingsville in a three-game series at Kingsville beginning at 7 p.m. today.

The Lady Buffs (17-7, 3-3) have lost three in a row, their worst skid of the season. Kingsville (18-7, 4-2) has won three in a row.

ASU SOFTBALL: Smooth transition for freshman star
It hasn't taken long for Sandy James to make her mark in college softball.

The freshman standout stepped right into the starting lineup for Angelo State University and has helped the Rambelles (23-3) vault to the top of the national rankings for the first time in school history.

She's been the biggest hitter on a team full of big hitters with a .405 batting average and 12 home runs in only 26 games (ASU's single-season HR record is 17).