PEORIA, Ill. -- The weekend Missouri Valley Conference softball series between Bradley and Loyola, which was originally scheduled to be played in Chicago Saturday and Sunday, has been relocated to Laura Bradley Park due to field conditions announced Thursday afternoon.
The Braves and Ramblers will now play a 1 p.m. doubleheader Saturday at Laura Bradley Park and wrap up the series Sunday with a single game at noon. In Loyola's first season in the MVC in 2014, Bradley took three of four games from the Ramblers, including an 8-7 come-from-behind victory in the MVC Tournament championship game back in May, and the Braves hold a 15-10 advantage in the all-time series.
BradleyBraves.com will provide links to live stats for all three games of the series and a free video stream for Sunday's series finale will be available through Bradley All-Access.
With the three games relocating to Peoria, Bradley is now in the middle of a 10-game home stand which would be the longest home stand for the Braves since April 2007.
The Braves have had a lot of close calls lately, wrapping up the three-game home series with Missouri State last weekend with a pair of 2-3 losses after taking the home opener 5-1 Saturday afternoon. Five of Bradley's last seven games have been decided by one run and eight of the last 10 have either been a one-run contest or gone to extra innings. Over the last 20 outings, 12 have needed extra innings or been one-run affairs and the Braves have already played 11 one-run games this spring after having 16 one-run contests last year in 57 games.
In four games against Loyola last year, senior Shannon King (San Jose, Calif./Archbishop Mitty) posted a .500 batting average (6-for-12) with one double, two homers, five runs scored and five RBI. King was 2-for-2 with two runs scored and three RBI in the MVC Tournament championship game. Sophomore pitcher Jaelen Hull (Clifton, Ill./Bishop McNamara) earned the victory in the MVC championship game against Loyola out of the bullpen and owns a 2-0 record with a 1.50 ERA in two career appearances against the Ramblers.
Freshman Erika Hansen (Fillmore, Calif./Moorpark) added a pair of doubles in the weekend series against Missouri State to push her conference-leading total to 12. Her 12 doubles are the most at Bradley since 2005 and rank as the sixth best season total in school history. In addition, she has a MVC high 21 base on balls this season, which is tied for the ninth-best season total in school history. Hansen is the only player in program history to collect 15 runs, 12 doubles, 20 walks and 20 or more RBI in a season.
Sophomore Kelly Kapp (Freeburg, Ill./Gibault Catholic) owns a 14-game hit streak entering the weekend series against Loyola after collecting a hit in the seventh inning of Sunday's series finale against Missouri State. Kapp's 14-game hit streak is the longest at Bradley since at least the 1992 season (complete game-by-game stats prior to 1993 are not available in the Bradley Athletics archives). She is hitting .407 (22-for-54) during her hit streak and has collected at least one hit in 23 of the last 24 games.
Senior pitcher Alyson Spinas-Valainis (Davenport, Iowa/Assumption) ranks among the top 10 in the MVC in innings pitched and strikeouts. A four-year letterwinner on the Bradley women's basketball team, Spinas-Valainis did not face Loyola last year in softball and is expected to make her debut in the circle against the Ramblers this weekend. She averaged 9.3 points and 5.3 rebounds per game in three career outings against Loyola on the hardwood.
After the weekend series against Loyola, Bradley will continue the season-long 10-game home stand Tuesday with a 4 p.m. game against Western Illinois.
