A nearly four month sports hiatus in Southeast Iowa will finally come to a close tonight when the baseball and softball season commences in the state. The Washington boys and girls of summer will open their season with a trip to Fairfield for a Southeast Conference matchup with their rival Trojans.
The Demon softball squad returns seven of nine starters from last year’s 22-15 season. They return two of three starters in the circle with Cara Linnenkamp having the top ERA in the league last year with 1.29 in 59 innings and Alexa Mitchell holding a 2.69 ERA in 68 innings. Kellie Dallmeyer is back for her junior year after posting a .461 batting average and 27 RBI. The Trojans are defending conference champs and their top seven bats return including Hannah Simpson’s .559 on base percentage.
Washington Head Coach Ben Obermann tells KCII Sports what he wants to see from his team in the first week. “The big thing the first week is we want to see us getting better so when that second week hits and the conference games matter to the standings we want to start hitting our groove. Physical mistakes are part of the game and will happen, but we can’t have any mental mistakes. We need to think the right things like our approach at the plate and talking on the field. As long as our mental side of the game is strong the physical things will take care of themselves.”
The Washington baseball team looks to improve on a 22-9 campaign in 2019 and a third place finish in the league. Luke Turner led the offense with a .406 batting average and will be a busy starter on the bump after a 0.88 ERA in 24 innings last summer. The Trojans are defending SEC champs, but they lost a loaded senior class including six of their top eight bats. Elan Ledger did some damage on the mound with a 1.70 ERA in 25 innings as a junior.
The baseball team has a single game starting at 7 p.m. and the softball team has a doubleheader getting underway at 5:30 p.m. from Fairfield. Listen to all of the softball action on FM 106.1 KCII starting at 5 p.m. Fans are expected to practice social distancing guidelines.