Ladines and Roush Earn MAC East Honors
5/2/2016 8:55:00 PM | Softball
CLEVELAND, Ohio – Junior Ronnie Ladines and senior Arika Roush have been named the Mid-American Conference East Division Pitcher and Player of the Week, respectively. The duo also swept the weekly honors from the conference following the opening weekend of the season.
Ladines, who earned her fourth career Pitcher of the Week accolade, threw a pair of shutouts and 16 shutout innings overall to pick up three victories at Bowling Green over the weekend. In addition to holding the Falcons scoreless, Ladines had 16 strikeouts and only 1 walk in the series. After recording back-to-back five-inning shutouts on Friday and Saturday, she took the circle when play resumed on Sunday and threw six more shutout innings. Ladines has now thrown 21 consecutive scoreless innings against MAC teams. She also recorded her third save of the season in mid-week action against Youngstown State. Ladines helped her own cause at the plate, batting .438 (7-for-16) with 3 doubles, 2 home runs, 6 RBIs and a 1.000 slugging percentage while extending her hitting streak to a career-best 12 games.
Roush, who earned her second career Player of the Week accolade, homered twice in the opening frame Friday at Bowling Green to set the tone for a series sweep. After leading off the game with a blast to left-center, Roush sent a three-run shot over the wall in left field for a commanding 8-0 lead before the hosts had a chance to hit. In the weekend finale, Roush came through with a double in the ninth inning that moved the eventual winning run to just 60 feet from home plate. She drove in the go-ahead run in a Game 2 win over Youngstown State with a clutch two-out single in the bottom of the sixth inning on Wednesday. For the week, Roush batted .467 (7-for-16) with 1 double, 2 home runs, 5 RBIs, 4 runs scored, 5 walks, a .933 slugging percentage and a .600 on-base percentage.
Kent State moved into first place in the MAC standings heading into the final week of the season after capturing its second straight series sweep at Bowling Green. The Golden Flashes run-ruled the Falcons in the first two games of the series and outscored them 19-1 over the three games.
Prior to wrapping up the regular season with a three-game series against MAC East rival Akron at the Diamond at Dix this weekend, the Flashes will go on the road for a mid-week doubleheader against #25/RV Ohio State at 4 p.m. on Wednesday.
