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--> --> May 1: Softball clash with OIT highlights big SOU weekend By Rich Rosenthal For the Ashland Daily Tidings In one of the most remarkable stories in Southern Oregon University athletic history, the Raiders softball team will play for a Cascade Conference championship Saturday in just its second season of intercollegiate action. Margin of error, however, is nil. In order to pull off the feat, the Raiders (26-4 overall, 14-4 CCC) need a sweep of 17th-ranked and defending conference champion Oregon Tech (36-8, 15-3) in the regular season finale for both teams at University Field. With the exception of bragging rights, institutional pride and the right to hoist a banner, the conference title is essentially meaningless in terms of national standing. Both squads will be among the four that vie for the coveted berth to the NAIA Championships at the regional fracas May 10-11 at Delta Park in Portland. SOU went 4-2 over the weekend, sweeping Concordia Friday before splitting a Saturday doubleheader against Eastern Oregon and a Sunday twin bill against Albertson. The wins over Concordia extended SOU's program-record win streak to 13 and clinched a berth to the NAIA Region I playoffs. That also no doubt helped the Raiders receive 10 NAIA top-25 poll points Monday to rank 29th nationally. Junior pitcher Brandi Brown, the region's pitcher-of-the-week honoree for the past two weeks, went 3-1 with a save to improve to a loop-best 23-5, but had a 10-game winning streak halted by EOU. Though Brown was hard-pressed to improve on back-to-back 4-0 weeks that included sub-0.90 ERAs, the former Colton High star was bullish at the plate, batting a team-best 10-for-17 (.588) to up her season clip 47 points to .346. Junior Academic All-American shortstop Latisha Inget, who went 9-for-17 last weekend, will enter the OIT game riding a 10-game hitting streak, one shy of freshman Haley Varley's school record established in March. Also for the Raiders, sophomore first baseman Lisa Aitchison, whose third home run went 235 feet against Albertson, is 7-for-her-last-13 (.538). SOU Track and Field After two months of preparation, the Southern Oregon University track and field team begins the championship season Saturday in La Grande. The Raiders embark Friday for the six-team Cascade Conference Championship, hosted by Eastern Oregon University at Community Stadium in La Grande. Southern won both men's and women's league titles with relative ease the past two seasons, but 2002 has the makings of a much different story. A deep Oregon Tech team and the homestanding Mountaineers are strong contenders to unseat SOU on the men's side, while OIT's Owls are expected to give the Raider women a stiff challenge. On paper, Southern Oregon, which has staked 13 conference team championships since 1955, boasts nearly half of the league's individual event leaders based on regular-season marks (11 women, five men), including reigning conference MVPs Tiwana Merritt and Jeff Bentley. The Raiders are particularly strong in the throwing events thanks to national qualifiers Bentley, Nicole Robertson, Justin Bennett and Richard Bailey. Saturday's event is the next-to-last opportunity for SOU athletes to achieve NAIA meet qualifying standards. Five Raider women (Merritt in the 400, Robertson in both the shot put and discus, Cass Smith, Megan Heuberger and Kena Page) and four men (Baily, Bentley, Bennett and Nick Dunn) have achieved automatic qualifying marks for nationals. Athletes without automatic qualifying marks who finish among national top-16 based on top season marks receive NAIA bids. Merritt and Robertson have a chance to become a part of SOU and Cascade Conference history at the district meet. Both will be looking to join former Raider All-American pole vaulter Nicole Irons and Eastern Oregon shot putter April Haney as the lone four-time single-event champions in loop history. Merritt will be going for her fourth 200 championship and Robertson will vie for her fourth discus win. Merritt will be completing what has arguably been the greatest career in Cascade Conference history at the meet. The two-time 400-meter All-American will attempt to equal her 2001 league-record of winning five conference events in the same season (the 100, 200 and 400 races as well as participating in the 4x100 and 4x400 relay team wins). Merritt, already a three-time league 200 champion and an eight-time league champ overall, has a chance to surpass Melanie Byrne's school-record of 11 career regional crowns captured between 1998 and '90. SOU Women's Tennis The Raiders fell short of the desired first-ever berth to the NAIA Championships, but capped the 2002 season with a two-dual win streak at the regional tournament last weekend in Lewiston, Idaho. Regional tourney title hopes were extinguished Friday with a 7-2 setback to the University of Alberta in the semifinals, but SOU bounced back with 5-2 wins over Seattle University and Albertson College Saturday for a third-place finish. Southern finished with a 13-4 season record and notched the program's second-highest win output in the 20-year history of the program. Freshmen Megan Loeding and Sabrina Dake, the No. 4 and 6 singles draws who form the squad's No. 3 doubles tandem, were the team's top regional performers. Loeding went 2-0 in singles (Dake was 2-1), and the duo won two of three doubles events. Loeding (22-5) and Dake (22-7) also tied with senior Lindsey Chrisman (22-5) for the team lead in victories. Chrisman, the primary No. 5 singles draw this season who played as high as No. 3 in her previous three tennis campaigns, capped her Raider career fourth on the school's all-time victory list with a 73-34 mark. The team's other senior, Julie Nelson of Grants Pass, finished with a 19-11 record and a 45-13 clip over the past two years. Head coach Gail Patton is now 48-11-1 as the Raider tennis coach (.808), the highest winning percentage of any SOU coach through four seasons. Email your... Technical questions & comments to: WebMaster Daily Tidings editorial comments & questions to: Editor Visit our other Oregon Newspapers... | Albany Democrat-Herald | Ashland Daily Tidings | Corvallis Gazette-Times | | Lebanon Express | Newport News-Times | Springfield News | Cottage Grove Sentinel | Ashland Daily Tidings 1661 Siskiyou Blvd. Ashland, OR 97520 Telephone 541-482-3456 © Copyright 2001 Lee Northwest Publishing