Princeton University Athletics
Players Mentioned
Softball to Host Monmouth for Pair Wednesday
April 18, 2011 | Softball
PRINCETON -- Monmouth will come to the Class of 1895 Field for a 3:30 p.m. twinbill Wednesday in the Princeton softball team's final non-league games before the Tigers host three straight Ivy League doubleheaders.
Princeton (13-21) is coming off a tough weekend at Penn where the Tigers were swept, but the Ivy South divisional race is still wide open. Cornell split its four-game series at Columbia to stand at 7-5, while Penn is one game back at 6-6. Princeton is three games back at 4-8, one game in front of Columbia, the Tigers' next Ivy opponent, at 3-9. All Ivy teams have eight games left before the regular league season wraps May 1.
Lizzy Pierce remains atop the Tiger batting average list at .341, just ahead of Kelsey VandeBergh, who was 5 for 9 with three walks over the Penn series, at .323. In the circle, Alex Peyton (4-11) has the team's lowest ERA at 3.67 and the highest number of innings at 95.1 on a three-member staff that includes Liza Kuhn (6-5, 7.89) and Michelle Tolfa (3-5, 5.32).
Princeton is 9-0 all-time against Monmouth with every game occurring between 1992 and 2003. This season, the Hawks are 15-18 overall and 6-8 in the Northeast Conference, boasting four hitters with better than a .300 average including Emily DeLong (.392), one of two players with a team-high six home runs along with Kate Kuzma. Lauren Sulick has thrown nearly three-quarters of the innings for Monmouth, and Sulick carries a 14-10 record with a 2.10 ERA.
Princeton will host Columbia Saturday and Sunday as the team returns to Ivy League play. Cornell will visit April 29 to close out the Ivy regular season home schedule before Princeton heads to Ithaca on May 1.