The Port Arthur News
PORT ARTHUR —
A year ago, the Lamar State College-Port Arthur softball team finished its season with just eight wins but plenty of hope for a strong sophomore returning class.
Now that wait has come to fruition thanks not only to those returning second-year players but a recruiting class that has the Seahawks competing on par with some of the top programs in the nation.
Now, as Lamar State enters a weekend series against LSU-Eunice and Southwest Mississippi, the 8-7 Seahawks need just two wins to set a new school record for most wins in a season.
“This team has the capability of really going a long way this year,” Coach Vance Edwards said. “We have the pitching depth and the hitting to really do something.”
The Seahawks will travel Friday to Eunice, La., where they will face SW Mississippi in a doubleheader at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m., then will take on LSU-Eunice in a Saturday double-dip at 2 and 4 p.m.
Although this past weekend’s schedule had been empty, the Lamar State coaches scrambled to find six games on Thursday and Friday and came away from that experience with four wins and a positive vibe among the Seahawks players.
“We went into the weekend after winning a few games and I didn’t want us to lose that momentum and interrupt that positive flow,” Edwards said. “So we called around and got some games together and we came out with four wins and two losses.”
Two of those wins came this past Thursday at Ford Park in Beaumont in a doubleheader against Ranger College. As soon as the Seahawks picked up those wins, they boarded vans and headed east to Mississippi where they split with East Central College and Jones County College.
Lamar State picked up a 10-2 win, then lost 4-3 after a late rally by East Central. Against Jones College, the Hawks fell 7-0 but came back in the second game 3-0 in a no-hit effort by Silsbee sophomore Danielle Treadway. Allison Angelle also slapped a solo home run shot in that game.
The no-hitter by Treadway, a transfer from Navarro College, is also a first for the program.
“Things were just clicking in that game,” Edwards said. “Danielle kept their hitters off balance and we did a good job in the field.”
So far this season, the Seahawks have faced No. 7 Chipola College, No. 6 Howard College and this weekend, they face NJCAA Division II No. 1-ranked LSU-Eunice.
Though Lamar State has been unable to come away with an early-season upset of a nationally ranked team, Edwards says this Seahawks team has the capability of being just as good as it wants to be as they progress through the 2012 schedule.
“We have never been to the (Region 14) conference tournament but this team has the ability and the talent to do that,” he said. “Every game we play, especially those against ranked competition, helps us get better. You can see it every time we go out there on the field.”
