BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – To open Southern Conference play, the Samford softball team will play host to the Mercer Bears for a weekend series that starts on Saturday at the Samford Softball Field.
The three-game weekend series gets underway on Saturday with a doubleheader starting at 1 p.m. CT. The weekend finale is slated for 1 p.m. on Sunday. All three games will be streamed on ESPN+ and Samford's game notes can be found here.
Saturday's doubleheader will be Kids Day at the park. A signing session will follow the second game with will be activities throughout including face painting and an appearance from Sam The Bulldog.
Not to be outdone by Kids Day, Sunday's doubleheader is scheduled to be Disney Day. Disney-themed giveaways and games will permeate the weekend finale.
Coming off of a historic weekend, Samford brings an 11-18 record into SoCon play.
Despite going 2-3 on the weekend at the Rebel Invitational, The Bulldogs knocked off host Ole Miss. The win was the first Samford victory over Ole Miss since 2001 and the first over an SEC team since 2007.
After splitting a doubleheader against Georgia State in the midweek, Mercer sits at 9-19 on the season.
Samford and Mercer have met 76 times in program history. The Bulldogs hold a 45-31 lead in the series. Samford has won five straight games against the Bears and seven of the last nine meetings. The Bulldogs are a 3-0 in SoCon openers against Mercer since the Bears joined the conference in 2014.
McKenzie Newcomb is once again leading the Bulldog pitching staff as the sophomore ranks 10th nationally with a strikeout-to-walk ratio of 9.90. Newcomb has also accumulated 99 strikeouts which ranks 30th nationally and an ERA of 1.66, good enough for 79th in the country.
Newcomb leads a pitching staff that ranks 54th in the country with 165 strikeouts on the season. The Bulldog team ERA ranks 78th at 2.82. Bulldog pitchers enter the midweek ranked 36th nationally with a strikeout-to-walk ratio of 3.11.
On the offensive side of things, the power-hitting duo of Logan Champion and Grier Bruce pace the Bulldog offense. Champion has collected a team-best ten doubles on the season, which ranks 19th nationally. Bruce leads the team with seven home runs and ranks second in the SoCon and 53rd nationally. The sophomore duo had a combined 38 at-bats as freshmen in 2022 and in 2023 they have a combined 33 RBIs.
Champion enters the midweek game against North Alabama riding
a season-high eight-game hitting streak.
Bruce's seven home runs on the year have already tied Mary Katherine Tedder and Timberlyn Shurbutt's team-leading home run total from last year in 24 fewer games.
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