April 11, 2006

BOCA RATON, FL - Opportunity knocks for the Florida Atlantic University softball team as the Owls travel to Tennessee for a conference road trip this weekend.

Florida Atlantic has the opportunity to put itself squarely back into the Atlantic Sun Conference race with six games in total against East Tennessee State, Belmont and Lipscomb, three teams that currently sit in the bottom four of the league standings. That schedule is a stark contrast to the Owls' four A-Sun opponents to date, three of which - Stetson, Kennesaw State and Campbell - rank in the top four of the standings.

The Owls (17-21, 4-4 A-Sun) enter the weekend trailing Stetson by three games after being swept by the Hatters this past Saturday 2-1 and 4-3 in DeLand. Stetson's schedule thus far has included Belmont and Lipscomb, leaving room for the Hatters to stumble as their schedule gets tougher for the remainder of the season.

Thursday's double-dip in Johnson City will be the first games ever between ETSU (13-28, 2-6 A-Sun) and FAU. The Bucs have split with North Florida and Jacksonville, were swept by Kennesaw State and Campbell and claimed a non-conference win over Belmont.

East Tennessee and Florida Atlantic went opposite directions in match-ups with Pittsburgh and Bowling Green during tournament season and both suffered defeats at the hands of the Huskies from Connecticut. Mary Catherine Vercoe (5-10, 5.40 ERA) and Courtney Jenkins (4-10, 3.62 ERA) are regular contributors on the mound and are among the top three batters for ETSU.

The Owls have thoroughly dominated Belmont (13-22-1, 1-9 A-Sun), allowing just five total runs in rolling to an 8-0 mark against the Bruins in the past four seasons. BU's lone conference win in 2006 came against Gardner-Webb, a team that FAU swept earlier in the season.

Belmont lost games to both BGSU (a 4-1 victory for FAU) and UT-Chattanooga (a 3-2 loss for FAU). Chelsea Goodwind (5-6, 3.48 ERA) carries the club's top ERA and is one of four Bruins hitting between .316 and .375 on the season.

Lipscomb (12-24, 3-7 A-Sun) and Florida Atlantic have split four games in their two-year series. LU has claimed solo wins over Campbell, GWU and Jacksonville this season while being swept by UNF and Stetson.

Auburn, a 10-0 loss for the Bisons, is the only non-conference opponent that Lipscomb shares with FAU, which split two games with the Tigers. Sara Meek (8-12, 2.20 ERA) has struck out 161 batters in 149 1/3 innings and leads the team with a .309 average.

Juniors Shauna Corso (Seal Beach, Calif.) and Jenna Lopez (Orangeburg, N.Y.) pace Florida Atlantic at the plate with .341 and .290 averages, respectively. Classmate Meghan Doonan (Wallingford, Conn.) and freshman Kathryn Stauffer (Pembroke Pines, Fla.) have thrown complete games in seven of FAU's eight A-Sun games and are expected to continue that trend this weekend.

Florida Atlantic plays at 2:00 p.m. EDT each day, Thursday through Saturday, with Belmont and then Lipscomb wrapping up the last two days of the trip.