The University of Maine softball team picked up its first three America East Conference wins last week, just in time to build momentum for the postseason.
The Black Bears finished out their regular season this past weekend with a series against Bryant University, and the young squad entered that series hoping to keep rolling after wins over UMass Lowell during last Monday’s doubleheader.
UMaine won both of those April 28 games against Lowell 1-0 and 3-2. The Black Bears then took one of three games against Bryant, bringing its conference record to 3-17 (11-35 overall) heading into the America East tournament.
Senior Nora Campo, who has played both catcher and first base, said last Thursday that the UMaine team was “definitely at a turning point” as it looked to take some momentum into the postseason.
One of just three seniors on a young team, Campo said she’d rather have the positive momentum now at this stage in the campaign.
“We have a saying where tournament is a new season, so you never really know what’s going to happen,” Campo said. “And we’ve had a history in the past of kind of showing up in tournament and surprising people.”
Head coach Kimberly Stiles, in her first year at the helm, called it “definitely a year of growth and learning” that has included starting “a ton of freshmen” this season. Stiles said Thursday that it’s been a “pretty big rebuild, and just a transition with a new coaching staff.”
She was excited by the two wins last Monday and thought they demonstrated what her young team is capable of heading toward the next part of the season.
“I think the postseason is always kind of the third season,” Stiles said. “I like where our momentum is at this point, and I like how our kids have played and responded. They’ve put the work in to start to see some success”
Freshman pitcher Maddison Simmerman got the win in last Monday’s 1-0 contest against UMass Lowell and junior Alysen Rieth secured the other win that day. Simmerman also threw a complete game in Friday’s 5-2 win over Bryant, striking out five Bulldogs in the victory.
“We want to be the team that’s outworking everybody else, and success comes from that,” Stiles said last week.
UMaine finished at the bottom of the conference during the regular season and playoff action will kick off on Wednesday with a 1:30 p.m. game against the University of Albany. The America East Conference tournament is being held at Binghamton University in New York.
“I think we’ve really laid a strong foundation this year with what we expect from the student athletes and from the program, and what that looks like moving forward,” Stiles said. “But also, we’re capable of doing good things this year, and we’re certainly doing some things really well and just working through kind of the learning process and getting where we want to be.”
