Games 35-37: Longwood (22-11, 7-2 Big South) vs. Liberty (29-8, 9-0 Big South)
Dates	April 6, 2018 April 8, 2018
Times	Friday, April 6 -- 3 p.m. (DH) -- Big South Network Saturday, April 8 -- 5 p.m. -- ESPNU
Location	Farmville, Va. | Lancer Field
Game Notes	Longwood (PDF) | Liberty (PDF)
Season Statistics	Longwood (HTML) | Liberty (HTML)
Live Stats	Longwood Live Stats
Social Media	@LongwoodLancers | @LongwoodSB

Leading Off
• Longwood closes its 10-game home­stand with a crucial Big South series against first-place and rival Liberty, with Sunday's game being nationally broad­casted on ESPNU.
• Longwood is playing its best softball of the season to date. The Lancers have won 13 of their last 16 and are in second-place in the Big South standings -- just two games back of Liberty.
• Sophomore Kasey Carr has been on a tear of late. She's collected hits in 14 of her last 19 games and in Friday's win over Campbell drove in a career-best three RBI.
• Despite playing top opponents across the country, Longwood has four players batting above the .300 mark after not having a single player bat above .300 a season ago. Kaylynn Batten leads the way with a .344, while, Jes­sica Smith (.326), Kasey Carr (.308) and Krista Kelly (.301) are all batting above .300.

By The Numbers
• A season after winning its fourth Big South championship in a five year span, Longwood looks to four-peat as the con­ference tournament champions in 2018.
• Longwood's non-conference opponents combined for more than 550 wins a sea­son ago with 12 of those teams finishing with a record of .500 or better. In addition, the Lancers will play six games against five different teams that made the 2017 NCAA Tournament.
• For the third straight season, Longwood was tabbed to win the Big South. Despite capturing four Big South Championships in its five previous seasons, the Lancers have only been tabbed to win the confer­ence in each of the last three seasons.
• Longwood returns six players that have earned Big South accolades throughout their career, including Kaylynn Batten, Karleigh Donovan, Sydney Gay, Krista Kelly, Kelsey Sweeney and Glenn Wal­ters.
• Longwood softball head coach Kathy Riley enters her 21st season leading the program. Longwood's all-time winningest coach, Riley has amassed more than 600 wins at Longwood and picked up her 700th career victory last season at the UNCG Invitational.
• In her 24 seasons of coaching, Kathy Rileyy has posted 22 consecutive seasons above the .500 mark. Her only two sea­sons below .500 were Riley's first two seasons at Mount Olive.
• Longwood picked up its sixth all-time win against a ranked opponent in the final game of the Aloha Tournament, defeat­ing then-No. 15 California. It marked the fourth-highest ranked opponent that Longwood has defeated in softball in the Division I era.
• Longwood softball signed six standout student-athletes in the early signing pe­riod for the 2019 season.

Last Time Out
• Backed by contributions throughout the lineup and strong pitching from Sydney Gay, Longwood won both midweek games -- 2-1 Tuesday versus Hampton and 10-7 Wednesday versus Elon.
• Gay spun a complete game gem Tuesday striking out 11 batters and allowing just one unearned run. She followed that with six strikeouts across five innings Wednesday to pick up her 15th and 16th wins of the season.
• Tuesday saw the Lancers score both runs in the first inning and hang on down the stretch for a 2-1 victory over future Big South foe Hampton.
• The bats came alive Wednesday as the Lancers improved to 3-0 when scoring 10- plus runs this season. The Lancers scored five runs in the bottom of the first and scored in five of their first six at-bats for the midweek win.
• Senior first baseman Kelsey Sweeney earned her first start after missing the first two months of the season recovering from injury. Sweeney got the scoring started for the Lancers with a three-run, bases-clear­ing double.
• In Wednesday's win, six different Lancers scored and eight collected hits as Karleigh Donovan led the way with a 3-for-4 day at the plate.

Scouting The Flames
• Liberty enters the weekend as the lone Big South team unbeaten in league play with a 9-0 record.
• Autumn Bishop and reigning Big South Freshman of the Year Amber Bishop lead the way offensively for Liberty as Autumn is batting .395 and Amber hitting .375. The twins have combined for 29 doubles, eight home runs and 51 RBI through 37 contests.
• Reigning Big South Pitcher of the Year Ju­lia DiMartino shoulders most of the load in the circle with a 17-5 record and 2.30 ERA across 130.2 innings pitched.
• Liberty leads the conference with a .308 team batting average and sits second be­hind Longwood with their 2.60 team ERA.

#GoWood