Our Lady of the Lake University News

OLLU News

Saints softball receives Red River Conference honors

Sun, May 2, 2010 - [Softball] - by Patricia Constantin

Our Lady of the Lake University garnered four of the five individual honors and placed three players in the2010 RRAC All-Conference Softball Team. Dawn Villegas was named Player of the Year, Corina Noel received Newcomer of the Year and Ashley Elizalde picked up Defensive Player of the Year. All three players are freshmen.

Coach Marie Stone was chosen as Coach of the Year, marking the third OLLU head coach to receive this honor in 2010 (Russell Vandlandingham -- men's basketball and Eric Moore -- men's golf).

Dawn Villegas excelled both on the field and at the batter's box. The freshman from San Marcos had 22 runs, 44 hits with six doubles, three home runs, 25 runs batted in (RBI) and five stolen bases on five attempts. Her batting average was .431 and slugging percentage was .578. Her fielding percentage was .921. As a pitcher, Villegas started 10 games, had four shutouts and three saves. She struck out 66 and walked 28. She won eight games and lost four for an ERA of 3.67. Villegas was also named to the All-Conference Team.

Newcomer of the Year Corina Noel, who is from Kingsville, Texas, had a batting average of .415 and a slugging percentage of .648 with 38 RBIs. Noel had 42 runs, 59 hits, nine doubles, three triples and six home runs. Noel was also named to the All-Conference Team.

Defensive Player of the Year, Ashley Elizalde, a graduate of Churchill High School in San Antonio, had a fielding percentage of .921.

Junior Tiffany Stritz had 25 runs, 41 hits, six doubles, four home runs, a batting average of .357 and a slugging percentage of .513. As a pitcher. the Houston native had three shutouts, a no-hitter with nine wins and four losses for an ERA of 1.98. Stritz was named to the All-Conference Team.

(Individual stats reported through April 23 when balloting was conducted.)

This is Coach Stone's first year as a head coach. The Saints were picked to finish fifth out of eight teams in pre-season polls conducted by the conference. As the inaugural regular season closed out last week, the team was one game behind top-ranked Texas Wesleyan University with an overall record of 28-14 and a conference record of 22-6. The Saints participated in the RRAC Championship Tournament, which began on April 30. They had an opening round bye and played Northwood University in the second round. In 10 innings, the Saints lost 4-5. The team faced Bacone College and beat them 7-3 to advance to the second day of competition on May 1. The Saints beat the University of the Southwest 4-2 and met Texas Wesleyan University on Saturday afternoon. The Lady Rams beat the Saints 2-1 to advance to the championship game against Northwood, while the Saints ended their season.

The following are the members of the 2010 Red River Athletic Conference Softball All-Conference Team as voted by the conference's coaches. The top 18 players in the conference were selected to the All-Conference Team regardless of position.

Name	School	Yr.	Pos.	Hometown
Kristy Britton*	Bacone College (Okla.)	Sr.	SS	Palm Springs, Calif.
Haley Butler*	Texas Wesleyan University	Jr.	C	Athens, Texas
Larisa Garcia	Northwood University (Texas)	Fr.	P	New Braunfels, Texas
Lauren Garza	Texas Wesleyan University	Sr.	UT	Edinburg, Texas
Chrissy Hood	Bacone College (Okla.)	Sr.		Broken Arrow, Okla.
Courtney Elliott*	Northwood University (Texas)	Sr.	C/3B	N. Richland Hills, Texas
Ashleigh Jimenez	Texas Wesleyan University	So.	2B	Burleson, Texas
Taylor Jones	Northwood University (Texas)	Fr.	P	Plano, Texas
Lateah Lucero*	Texas Wesleyan University	Jr.	UT	Pilot Point, Texas
Tancy Matthews	Northwood University (Texas)	Jr.	C/3B	Longview, Texas
Corina Noel	OLLU (Texas)	Fr.	2B/OF	Kingsville, Texas
Ashley Oldham*	Texas Wesleyan University	Sr.	P	Watauga, Texas
Hopie Perez	Texas Wesleyan University	So.	IF	Weatherford, Texas
Katie Poirier*	University of the Southwest (N.M.)	Jr.	1B	Miami, Fla.
Leigh Anne Rainey*	Northwood University (Texas)	Sr.	OF	Flower Mound, Texas
Alex Ramirez*	Bacone College (Okla.)	Sr.	2B	LaPorte, Texas
Tiffany Stritz	OLLU (Texas)	Jr.	P/1B	Houston, Texas
Dawn Villegas	OLLU (Texas)	Fr.	P/1B	San Marcos, Texas
*Indicates player is a repeat selection.