Ohio Valley Conference Softball Tournament; Racer seniors reflect on first OVC softball
OXFORD, Ala. — As Murray State prepares to open play today in this year’s Ohio Valley Conference Softball Tournament, there is definitely a different feel than in past years.
The Racers are entering this year’s event with something, in fact, they have never had — a “1” by their name when it comes to seeding, the distinction given to the regular-season champion. It is something for which this program has battled since it started at Murray State in 2010 and that is not lost on its seniors, all of whom have been in the program the past five years.
“It just feels so good to have been the team to have done this. It’s a pretty unreal feeling, especially after being here for five years of working toward this, just grinding season after season,” said shortstop Sierra Gilmore on Sunday afternoon after the Racers’ 5-2 win over Morehead State in Murray that clinched that first-ever regular-season title in Murray State’s final year as an OVC member. Murray State will head to the Missouri Valley Conference next season.
“There’s a lot of feelings right now. It’s definitely bittersweet, but there is no better feeling than to walk off Racer Field for the last time than as OVC champions. It’s also definitely hard for this (senior) class. We’ve called this place home, some of us, for five years now, but it feels really amazing to be champions and walk off together.
“This is huge. It’s pretty unreal and I think we felt the weight of doing this not only for our team and our class (which includes Gilmore, outfielder Logan Braundmeier and outfielder Jensen Striegel, who has been out the past few weeks with a foot injury) but the classes that came before us and weren’t able to do this.”
For a team that had never celebrated a conference crown, the Racers seemed to get their money’s worth Sunday. Director of Athletics presented commemorative softballs to pitcher Hannah James for achieving the career-strikeouts mark, Gilmore for career batting average and Head Coach Kara Amundson for notching her 250th career win during the season.
The players also showed they were well versed in the art of using hand-held confetti cannons, showering the home plate area with multiple colors of the stuff. And, as for the game itself, senior outfielder Logan Braundmeier supplied some color with a double that got the Racers going after a rough outing in the day’s first game, a surprising 1-0 loss.
“It was really big (to get that hit). It actually meant a lot to do that,” said Braundmeier, whose team received some much-needed help from Southeast Missouri Sunday as it swept Belmont, the team that was a game ahead of Murray State as the final weekend of OVC play began, in a doubleheader. Murray State learned that SEMO won the first game minutes after dropping the first game to Morehead.
“That definitely got the weight off our shoulders. I mean, Morehead had nothing to lose and that’s the hardest thing for a team like us, so it did help. We also didn’t want to be co-champions either.”
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