Cajuns welcome into town Texas A&M Corpus-Christi, Prairie View A&M, and the headliner pre-season #24 Ole Miss this weekend for the Ragin Cajun Invitational. Should be a weekend of good softball. Sounds like a few additions to the team this weekend as well, with Bethaney Noble expected to be available and Cecilia Vásquez working her way back from a concussion. If Vasquez is back, I think the lineup looks something like this.
Williams CF
Marceaux C
Smith DP
Knox LF
Hart RF
Manning 1B
Otto 3B
Vasquez SS
Liscano 2B.
Lineup all of a sudden is pretty dang deep with above-average power bats. A sweep this weekend would be great, but probably not expected. Split 2 with Ole Miss and win the others, and it’d be a great weekend.
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Pitching and defense will have to improve quickly to compete with the better teams coming up in the next few weeks. Being dangerous throughout the lineup on offense is fun to watch!
I would not disagree too much with that lineup, though, I would switch Hart and Marceaux in the order, and move Vasquez to the 6 hole.
Nicest thing about that lineup is that there are 7 players that have the potential to have 10 or more HR, and the other two are capable of 10 or more total extra base hits.
Second best thing is that there is only one Senior in the bunch.
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I don’t totally disagree with that, our pitching does need lots of improvement, but ….. we currently sit 2nd in the SBC in Fielding %, so I am not overly concerned there.
Also, don’t underestimate how good our competition was this past week. Even Tulsa is likely better than anyone not in the ACC, Big 10, Big 12 or SEC that we play before conference starts. Of course, we do have 7 games against schools in those 4 conferences in the next 2 weeks.
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There were some hidden things on defense that don’t show up as errors but led to runs that need to be cleaned up. Fielding percentage doesn’t always tell the whole story. And so it’s not too negative, there was a lot of good defense played a majority of the time.
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I’m very tempted to move Hart into the 2 hole as well to let her hit in front of the big power bats. A 3-4-5 of Smith, Knox, Marceaux is definitely formidable.
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I agree with Hart in the 2-hole. She seems to have a great approach and can do damage, especially with the protection behind her.
Hopefully pitching can develop quicker than it probably should. Lot to ask of ladies who haven’t thrown competitively in 1-2 years.
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I agree that our inexperience in the outfield, combined with a bad defensive day for Williams in center, along with the bobbles on a couple of ground balls that were ruled hits and a poor decision by a freshman, is concerning; but I know that the freshmen will get more comfortable and Williams won’t have many bad days.
Against Ole Miss, Florida State, LSU, aTm and OU, our pitching is a major concern [because we are unlikely to hit their pitching as well as we hit against the three decent teams we played last week] and the defense will have to clean up some minor issues; I believe we can ooverpower most of the rest of our non-conference foes.
This week will tell us a lot about how good the SBC is, since [besides our 2 with Ole Miss] they play 16 games against SEC, ACC, Big 10 and Big 12 schools.
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What do some of yall with more knowledge see for Miki Watts this year? I know she came in with some hype off the Team USA appearance. Assuming some spot duty at most or potential redshirt?
I think that your assumption is likely correct.
It has been a point of discussion among several of us. The consensus seems to be that because we have good depth in the middle infield that she will redshirt, barring injuries to two or more of those now playing SS or 2B. Of course, that is just speculation, as none of my group are in the room with the coaches. I do know that she has been taking pregame reps with the middle infield group.
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Same observations I had exactly VO. The games this weekend will be interesting to see what strides we make from last weekend.
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Scores from Games of Interest 2/10/26
Our Opponents [Bold Print] go 3-2
USM 0 Ms St 5
Liberty 0 FSU 8
Kennesaw St 2 Ga Tech 10
SFA 2 ULM 3
Marshall 3 Florida A&M 2
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I’m gonna copy what you did but for today lol.
2/11/26
Abilene Christian 3 South Dakota State 12
Coastal Carolina 2 North Carolina 8
Abilene Christian 5 South Dakota State 8
Marshall 3 North Florida 4
Missouri 1 UCF 5
Our opponents went 0-5 today