Softball Faces Nebraska On Wednesday For First Midweek Game Of Season

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Creighton travels down Interstate 80 to Lincoln for a contest against in-state rival Nebraska in a midweek contest.

Matchup
Wednesday, March 21 • Creighton (11-9) at Nebraska (20-9) • 6 p.m.
(Game was originally scheduled for March 20 at 6 p.m.)

Follow The Games
Wednesday's game will be live streamed on BTN Plus, which can be found at www.btn2go.com.

Live stats will be available through the Nebraska Athletics website. A link to the live stats can be found at GoCreighton.com.

Scoring updates and infographics will be provided via Twitter at @BluejaySoftball.

Scouting Creighton (11-9)
The Bluejays enter their contest against Nebraska after a 1-2 showing while hosting the Creighton Tournament this past weekend.

Creighton defeated Wichita State 12-11 in extra innings on Saturday night, but scored only four combined runs during two losses against Iowa on Saturday (4-3) and the Shockers on Sunday (9-1).

Freshman Courtney Sandell leads the Bluejays with a .382 batting average while playing 18 games and making 12 starts.

Senior centerfielder Sam Crowley ranks second on the team with a .373 batting average. Crowley has 19 hits this season after having only 19 all of last season (87 at-bats) and 20 hits combined during her first three seasons at Creighton.She also owns the second-highest slugging percetage (.549) with three home runs.

Ashley Cantu has started all 20 of Creighton's games in the lead-off position of the batting order and paces the team in hits (21), runs scored (18), walks (10) and stolen bases (3-3).

Kelli Finan ranks second in the BIG EAST in slugging percentage (.660), leads the Bluejays with four home runs and is tied for the team lead with 18 RBIs.

As a team, the Bluejays lead the BIG EAST in batting average (.310), on-base percentage (.401), runs per game (5.65) and slugging percentage (.436). The team's on-base percentage ranks 22nd across all of Division I.

Bryana Clark leads Creighton with a 1.96 ERA during 53.2 innings pitched. The entire pitching staff ranks second in the BIG EAST with a 3.52 ERA.

Scouting Nebraska (20-9)
The Cornhuskers finished this past weekend 3-2 at the Easton Invitational in Fullerton, California.

Kaylan Jablonski leads Nebraska offensively with 35 hits (.368 batting average) and owns a team-best seven home runs and .663 slugging percentage. Jablonski also paces the pitching staff with a 2.51 ERA during 94.2 innings of work.

Tristen Edwards leads the team in runs scored (22), RBIs (22) and doubles (8).

As a team the Huskers are hitting .272 and averaging 4.28 runs per game.

The Nebraska pitching staff owns a 3.31 team-ERA, and the team has allowed only nine unearned runs as the Huskers ranked ninth nationally with a .980 fielding percentage (16 errors in 29 games).

Series History Against Huskers
Nebraska leads the all-time series 84-37.

The Huskers defeated the Bluejays 5-4 last season in Omaha.

Wednesday's meeting in Lincoln marks the first contest between the two schools at Bowlin Stadium since the 2015 season.

Creighton's last victory against Nebraska occurred on April 25, 2012 (2-1) in Omaha.

The Bluejays last win in Lincoln came on April 1, 2009 (3-0).

McGill Extends Hitting Streak To 10
Jayci McGill enters Wednesday's game on a 10-game hitting streak.

The junior infielder has had one hit during each of her past 10 games played (all starts).

McGill is 10-for-30 (.333) with three runs scored, two doubles, two RBIs, two walks and a home run during her current hitting streak.

First Career Home Run Proves Timely
Sophomore Mikaela Pechar hit her first career home run on Saturday against Wichita State during a pinch-hit opportunity.

Pechar launched a three-run home run to tie the game at 10-10 during the bottom of the fifth inning before the Bluejays defeated the Shockers 12-11 in eight innings.

First Official NCAA RPI Rankings Released
Creighton ranked 105th in the initial RPI rankings released on Monday.

The Bluejays are the second-highest ranked BIG EAST school as DePaul checked in at No. 61.

Nebraska is No. 19 in this week's RPI rankings.

Midweek Games
Wednesday marks the first midweek game of Creighton's 2018 scheduled.

The Bluejays were scheduled to play at UMKC on Tuesday, March 6 but weather forced the cancellation of that game.

Creighton is scheduled to play five midweek games on four different dates during the remainder of the season.

The Jays finished 2-3 during midweek games last season.

Jays Keeping It Close
Creighton did not play any one-run games during the first three weeks of the season before playing three at the Mizzou Tournament in Columbia, Missouri (March 2-4).

The Bluejays defeated Drake 2-1, and lost to Southeastern Louisiana 4-3 and Drake 2-1.

Creighton has played in five one-run games overall this season (all during the month of March) and is 2-3 during those contests.

The Bluejays played in 14 one-run games in 2017, and went 7-7.

Creighton also finished 4-1 during one-run BIG EAST contests.

The Bluejays owned two walk-off one-run victories last season.

Small-ball Bluejays
Creighton owns 20 sacrifice bunts and five sac flies through 20 games this season.

Sam Crowley leads the team with five sacrifice bunts while Victoria Alvarez and Ashley Cantu each have three.

The Bluejays had a total of seven sacrifice flies and 44 sac bunts during 2017. Creighton led the BIG EAST in sacrifice bunts for the second consecutive season.

The Jays finished with five sacrifice flies and led the league with 48 sacrifice bunts during the 2016 season, including 15 from senior Kelsey Allender.

Finan Makes BIG EAST Honor Roll
Junior utility player Kelli Finan made last week's BIG EAST honor roll (March 12) after going 4-for-10 with a home run, double and 5 RBIs during three games against Southeast Missouri. She also scored a team-high three runs during the home-opening weekend.

Finan delivered a walk-off three-run home run during the season-opener on March 9 during Creighton's 6-3 victory.

Walk-off Victory History
Kelli Finan's three-run home run with two outs during the bottom of the seventh inning to propel Creighton to a 6-3 victory over Southeast Missouri during the Bluejays' home-opener (March 9) marked Creighton's first walk-off victory since Sam Dellinger hit a three-run home run in the bottom of the fifth inning as the Jays run-ruled Butler 11-2 on April 22, 2017.

Allie Reinhart also delivered a walk-off sacrifice fly to help the Jays defeat Butler 4-3 during the first game of Creighton's doubleheader against the Bulldogs (4/22/17), less than two hours before Dellinger's game-ending home run.

Prior to Finan's blast on March 9, the last time Creighton earned a victory with a walk-off home run during the seventh inning or later was on April 5, 2014 when Alexis Cantu hit a two-run home run during the bottom of the 16th inning against Villanova.

Softball Faces Nebraska On Wednesday For First Midweek Game Of Season

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Players Mentioned

Victoria Alvarez

Ashley Cantu

Bryana Clark

Sam Crowley

Kelli Finan

Jayci Foster

Mikaela Pechar

Courtney Sandell