April 8, 2004
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STORYLINE: Mountain West Conference play continues for the Rebel softball team this week as it hosts rival New Mexico (26-18, 0-0) and defending league champ Colorado State (24-9, 0-0) in a pair of doubleheaders this weekend ... UNLV (19-23, 2-2) sits in a four-way tie atop the MWC standings after earning two road wins in the first week of play ... The Lobos will open league play against UNLV on Friday, April 9, at 5:00 p.m. ... All children under 12 will be admitted free on Friday as part of an attempt to "Sell Out Eller Media Stadium" ... The Rams will hit Las Vegas for an Easter Sunday twin bill after two games at San Diego State on Friday ... An Easter egg hunt for children under 12 will take place on the field between games ... UNLV is 10-8 at home this year, but has not played in its friendly confines since March 14 ... With four games on tap for the weekend, the Rebels look to earn the school's 600th all-time victory in softball.
ABOUT UNLV: Under first-year head coach Lonni Alameda, the Rebels return 12 letterwinners and nine starters from their 2003 squad. Offensively, the Rebels are led in hitting by senior left fielder Bridget Byrne (.452/0/10), although senior Lisa Sampson (.302/0/16) has led the squad in hitting each of the last three years ... Junior third-baseman Pauline Glenn (.237/3/16), an All-Mountain West Conference choice as a freshman, leads the unit with three homers, while senior Kacey Ellis (.274/0/22) paces the squad in RBI. Defensively, junior pitcher Jacqueline Kerrigan (16-14, 1.85) was an all-conference selection last year and leads the Rebels in the circle with 16 wins and 179 strikeouts.
HEAD COACH Lonni Alameda: The UNLV softball team has a new face in the dugout this year as Lonni Alameda is in her first season as the Rebels' head coach. Alameda came to Las Vegas from Stanford University, where she oversaw the Cardinal pitching staff and helped coach the team to six straight NCAA Regional appearances. A two-sport star at the University of Oklahoma, Alameda was a two-time All-Big Eight infielder and hit .359 as a senior in 1992. She earned her first career victory in a 3-2 eight-inning decision over New Mexico on Feb. 6.
REBELS ON THE WEB: All UNLV softball up-to-the-minute information, including team roster and bios, season schedule and results, and game and season statistics, is available on the school's Official Athletics Site, www.unlvrebels.com. A member of the Official College Sports Network, unlvrebels.com utilizes Gametracker, the state-of-the-art software to support live internet scoring. Through Gametracker, fans can follow Rebel softball action pitch-by-pitch from around the globe. For a complete schedule, log on to unlvrebels.com.
REBELS ON THE AIR: UNLV head coach Lonni Alameda can be heard every Monday at 8:00 p.m. PT on the Rebel Softball Update on KDWN AM 720 Talk Radio. Along with host and former UNLV football coach Harvey Hyde, Alameda will spend a segment talking Rebel softball, including recapping the team's play the weekend before and scouting the squad's upcoming opponents.
ABOUT NEW MEXICO: New Mexico improved to 26-18 with a 1-0 win over Eastern New Mexico on Tuesday, snapping a four-game losing streak ... Friday's games will mark the first in league play for the Lobos, who were rained out of last weekend's scheduled doubleheader against Colorado State ... Lobo head coach Kim Newbern has compiled a 50-55-1 record in just under two full seasons in Albuquerque and is 260-166-1 overall in her eighth year ... The Lobos are led in hitting by Stephanie Kennedy (.319/2/15) and in pitching by Ashley Perkins (12-5, 1.92) ... UNLV and UNM have already met once this year, with the Rebels wrestling a 3-2 extra-inning victory away at the Pepsi Arizona Tournament on Feb. 6 ... The Rebels have won two straight in the series, ending the Lobos' 2003 season on a seventh-inning home run by Pauline Glenn in the consolation bracket of the Mountain West Conference Championship ... UNLV trails 16-18 in the all-time series.
ABOUT COLORADO STATE: At 24-9, Colorado State owns the best overall record in the league, but it has not yet played a conference game after last weekend's opener in Albuquerque, N.M., was rained out ... The Rams, the defending MWC champions, are in the midst of an eight-game winning streak and have not lost since March 15 when they fell to Liberty, 3-2 ... Head coach Mary Yori is 90-94 in her fourth season at CSU and has an overall record of 549-252-2 in her 15th season ... The Rams are led in hitting by Ricki Walker (.447/2/20), but have no real standout among the four players on the pitching staff ... Jessi Strickland (7-3, 2.70) leads the team in both wins and losses, while JayCee Wood (6-2, 1.74) is the squad's ERA leader ... Southern Utah is the only team common to both UNLV's and CSU's schedules to date ... The Rebs dismantled SUU, 10-3, while the Rams split a twin bill, losing 5-3 before a 7-0 shutout win ... CSU took four of the five meetings between the two last year, including a 7-1 victory that ousted the Rebels from the MWC Tournament and ended their season ... Colorado State leads the all-time series 20-15.
RANKED OPPONENTS: Through 42 games, the Rebels have played 11 games against teams ranked in the NFCA Top 25 and five more against teams that received votes at some point during the year. On top of that, UNLV played a pair of games against the top-ranked team in NAIA, Simon Fraser.
KERRIGAN ALMOST THROWS NO-NO: UNLV junior Jacqueline Kerrigan almost turned one of the most special feats in the game. The Eugene, Ore., native carried a no-hitter against Utah Valley State into the seventh inning, but was disappointed when the Wolverines' Jamie Hendricks dropped a base hit into shallow centerfield with two outs. Kerrigan struck out the next batter to record the complete-game shutout and finish her second career one-hitter. The game came one day on the heels of another no-hit bid by the Rebels' ace - she held top-ranked NAIA power Simon Fraser hitless until the fifth inning, but left the game after the suspense was broken and the Rebels ahead 7-0.
WEEKLY WINNERS: It took just one week for Rebel ace Jacqueline Kerrigan to earn her first Mountain West Conference Pitcher of the Week award. In the first week of the year, Kerrigan was cited by the conference for posting a 2-2 record and striking out 27 batters in four games at the Pepsi Arizona Tournament in Tucson, Ariz. It was the fourth time in her career that the Rebels' junior pitcher had been so honored.
On March 16, the Rebels claimed their second conference award as senior outfielder Bridget Byrne earned the league's Player of the Week honor after hitting .632 in five games. It was the first-ever award in the Las Vegas native's career. Byrne hit safely in each game, scored in all but one of them, and belted her first career triple in leading the Rebels to a 4-1 record for the week.
CAREER PITCHING LEADERS, PART ONE: Senior Kacey Ellis continues to make her mark on the UNLV record books. The Brentwood, Tenn., native already ranks ninth all-time with 90 appearances and eighth with a .469 (23-26) career winning percentage. With 23 career victories, she needs just three more to move past Brandi Isgar for 10th place on the school's all-time list. Her three career saves rank her fifth in the school's history.
CAREER PITCHING LEADERS, PART TWO: Ellis isn't the only active pitcher working her way through the record books. Junior Jacqueline Kerrigan has already scribbled her name throughout the career marks, ranking in appearances, starts, complete games, innings pitched, wins, losses, saves, shutouts, ERA and strikeouts. Perhaps most impressive in her strikeout total, which currently sits at 445 and ranks her third in school history. She needs just 48 more to move past Amie Stewart, and trails leader Lori Harrigan by 289. She is on pace to finish second in school history behind Harrigan.
YEAR OF THE WORKHORSE: Kerrigan's career numbers are pretty staggering for a player in her junior year, and they have been significantly bolstered by the frequency of her play this season. Kerrigan has thrown almost 70 percent of the team's innings this year. Her 179 strikeouts on the year -- a career high -- already rank as the fourth-best single season total in school history. She needs just 45 strikeouts over that span to break Lori Harrigan's 1991 record of 223.
LEADING OFF BY EXAMPLE: The Rebels are undoubtedly gracious for the leadoff play of senior Bridget Byrne. The Rebels' leadoff hitter is having a career year. She has already eclipsed her personal best totals for hits in a season and has nearly doubled her batting average from a year ago. Through 42 games, the Rebels' left fielder has collected 61 hits in 135 at bats for an amazing .452 average. If that average holds throughout the season, she would break the school record of .445 set by Kim Rondina in 1997. Byrne leads the Mountain West Conference in hits and ranks second in the league in batting average. An honor student from Las Vegas, Byrne has not missed a start in left field in three year, a span of 166 games.
MY BIG FAT GREEK OLYMPIC TEAM TRYOUT: The Rebels were without the services of starting third baseman Pauline Glenn in the team's doubleheader at Arizona. The Tucson, Ariz., native is a member of the Greek National Team and spent the week of March 22-29 participating in a workout with the team in preparation for the upcoming Summer Olympic Games. A third-generation Greek descendent, Glenn has been working out with the Greek Team since last summer. If she is chosen for the Greeks' final Olympic roster, she would join Lori Harrigan as Rebels competing in the Olympic Games.
PRESEASON POLLS: While UNLV did not rank in the Top 25 poll, the Rebels did check in at No. 5 in the Mountain West Conference Preseason Coaches Poll announced Jan. 22. With 23 points and four first-place votes, San Diego State was chosen as a slight favorite to win its third straight league title over Colorado State, which scored 21 points and the other two first-place votes. Rounding out the poll were BYU (18), Utah (13), UNLV (9) and New Mexico (6).
ON DECK: Following this week's doubleheaders, the Rebels go back on the road for three games. They will stop in Riverside, Calif., to play a single against UC Riverside on Thursday, April 15, on their way to San Diego for a MWC doubleheader against San Diego State on Friday, April 16.
