Mercer baseball, softball players honored by Southern Conference

Mercer's baseball and softball teams are represented in the latest Southern Conference weekly honors.

Mercer softball shortstop Emma Andrew and pitcher Stella Preston have been named the Southern Conference Softball Player and Pitcher of the Week, respectively, for games held March 20-26, the league announced Monday.

Andrew hit .545 and slugged .909 in the Bears’ conference-opening series against Chattanooga last weekend with Mercer winning Sunday’s rubber match, 9-2.

The junior led the Bears’ comeback effort in Mercer’s 4-3 loss in Saturday’s opening contest, going 2-for-4 at the plate and recording an RBI in the bottom of the fifth inning to cut the Mocs’ lead to one run. She was 1-for-3 with a run in the nightcap.

She went 3-for-4 on Sunday, and was a triple shy of hitting the cycle.

Preston posted a 0.00 ERA in six innings for the Bears in Saturday’s doubleheader, giving up two runs in her two appearances. Preston earned a save in the Bears’ first conference win, and struck out five in two games.

Mercer catcher Charlie Madden is the conference baseball player of the week.

Madden hit .400 and slugged 1.000 in five games last week to help the Bears to a 4-1 mark and a series win to open Southern Conference play. He hit three home runs and three doubles — six of his eight hits went for extra bases — and drove in eight runs, scoring seven times.

Madden hit .556 in the Bears’ two-game midweek sweep Florida A&M. In Tuesday’s 9-2 win, he was 2-for-4 with a homer, a double, a walk, two RBI and three runs scored. The next day, he doubled in a 3-for-5 effort, scoring twice and driving in a run in the 11-5 win.

Against ETSU in the weekend series, Madden hit a tie-breaking two-run homer in the eighth inning of Friday’s 5-2 win. The next day, he had an RBI double and a two-run homer in the first two innings of a 5-2 win. He drew a walk in Sunday’s 9-2 loss as the Bucs avoided the sweep.

Bears host Yellow Jackets

Mercer had an eight-game winning streak stopped on Sunday, and the Bears will try to get another streak started on Tuesday when they host Georgia Tech.

First pitch at OrthoGeorgia Park is 6 p.m. Fans wearing orange will be admitted for free.

Mercer is 21-5 overall and 14-2 at home, while Georgia Tech is 13-9 overall and 3-4 on the road.

The Bears are off their lowest run output of the season in a 9-2 loss Sunday to ETSU.

The Yellow Jackets have lost four of five and five of seven. They lost the series at Wake Forest last weekend and were outscored 31-19.

Austin Wilhite leads Tech with a .384 average, while Joey Bart is batting 340 with the team high in homers (9) , plus 24 RBI. Kel Johnson is hitting .287 with eight homers and team-best 26 RBI.

Georgia Tech is 2-0 against in-state teams, with two games against Kennesaw State cancelled. Mercer has swept Georgia and Savannah State to enter at 4-0 against in-state teams.

Danny Edgeworth is batting .381 for Mercer, while Charlie Madden has 11 homers and 33 RBI to go with a .351 average.

The game is a reunion of sorts. Georgia Tech undergraduate assistant coach Tyler Gibson is the son of Mercer head coach Craig Gibson.

Weekend review

The Georgia College baseball team took both games of the Saturday doubleheader on the road against Young Harris with a huge comeback win in game one 14-13, followed by a 16-7 blowout in game two.

Georgia College (19-8, 7-5 PBC) mounted a huge comeback in game one, down as many as 10 runs early in the contest. It took a while for the bats to get going, but the Bobcats ended up scoring 14 runs on a whopping 20 hits compared to the Young Harris (10-17, 4-8 PBC) 13 runs on 15 hits.

The Bobcats trailed 11-1 after four innings, yet came back for a one-run lead. It was tied at 12 after six, and Georgia College regained the lead in the eighth, adding a solo homer from Logan Mattix in the ninth.

The lead was 14-12 in the bottom of the ninth, and the Mountain Lions managed a run before Grant Khan worked out of a bases loaded jam to earn the save.

Former Perry standout Cal Gentry was among those who had a three-hit game for Georgia College.

The second game was one-sided, Georgia College putting up 19 hits.

Georgia College returned to the NCBWA regional poll at No. 9. The Bobcats host Columbus State this weekend.

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Emma Andrew was 3-for-4 with three RBI and Mercer pounded the ball early in a 9-2 win over Chattanooga in Southern Conference sofbtall Sunday afternoon at Sikes Field.

The win clinched the opening series of league play for the Bears (16-20, 2-1).

Mercer scored three runs in the first inning and three in the fourth, never trailing. Andrew was one of five Bears with multiple hits as Mercer scored all nine runs in the first four innings.

Mercer hosts ETSU for a three-game series starting on Saturday.　

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The Georgia College softball team dropped two high-scoring games to visiting Young Harris College Sunday.

The Bobcats were within striking distance in both games, falling 11-7 and 9-5.

The losses put Georgia College at 10-4 in Peach Belt Conference play, good for third, and 24-14 overall. Young Harris is 29-7 and 9-5.

The Bobcats are back in action Saturday at Montevallo.

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Trailing 7-0 to William Peace, the Wesleyan softball team made a strong run at the Pacers in the seventh inning but came up just short, falling to the USA South foe 8-5 on Sunday.

The Pacers took the first game of the doubleheader as well, 8-0.

Wesleyan travels to Agnes Scott on Wednesday.　

This story was originally published March 27, 2017 at 9:07 PM with the headline "Mercer baseball, softball players honored by Southern Conference."