Following a tough SEC series over the weekend, the No. 4 Tennessee softball team (36-8) will get a break from conference play when the Lady Vols face Furman tonight at 6 p.m. inside Lee Stadium.
The Paladins come into Tuesday’s game with a 25-20 record overall and sit tied for second in the Southern Conference.
Furman has won nine of their previous 11 games after starting out the season winless in their first five.
However, Furman owns an 0-4 record in games against SEC opponents South Carolina and Georgia this season, with an aggregate score of 32-1 in those matchups.
The Tennessee coaching staff, however, said they’re not willing to take the midweek matchup lightly after what they saw as a poor performance last weekend.
“They’ve got a first year coach that has done a lot of things with them,” co-head coach Ralph Weekly said. “If we play against Furman the way we played (Sunday), the results could be the same. I don’t think we will, but they’re a good team. They’re not a rinky-dink team.”
The Lady Vols went 1-2 at home against Mississippi State in the weekend series, but senior Madison Shipman remains confident in her team.
“I definitely think we can rebound,” Shipman said. “This is a really good team. Obviously, this wasn’t the weekend that we wanted to have, but I think we’ll bounce back no problem.”
The Tennessee coaches have used midweek games in the past as a time to experiment with new lineups in the past to get them ready for the weekend conference games.
Two weeks ago, the coaches made several shifts in the defensive lineup in a Tuesday game against Tennessee Tech, and after four errors in Sunday’s loss to Mississippi State, more changes could be on the way.
Junior Alley Perkins was given her first two starts at third base in place of freshman Taylor Koenig, who has started 37 games at third base this season.
However, the switch was not a successful one as the junior college transfer from Santa Ana College (Calif.) committed three errors from third base on Sunday and only recorded one hit in four at-bats.
“What we just told them in there is that this is one of 50 games,” Weekly said after Sunday’s game. “That’s all. You can’t worry about it. We just got beat. We’re not used to losing series on this field, but we lost one or two last year too and still ended up finishing second in the nation.”
UT will also use Tuesday’s game as a way to stay “in sync,” according to Weekly after he was dissatisfied with his pitchers’ performances against Mississippi State, which may prompt him to alter his method of using pitchers behind senior all-American Ellen Renfroe in the order.
Shipman, a Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award finalist, tried to focus on how her team can improve after a loss.
“We’re going to be learning from this weekend,” Shipman said, “and learn from our mistakes and take it to them on Tuesday.”
