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Hot-hitting Wolverines face slumping Spartans in pair

Over the weekend, the Michigan softball pitching staff froze Northwestern hitters, allowing only two runs in the three-game series.

But Michigan coach Carol Hutchins looked to other elements to explain her team's weekend sweep of Northwestern.

"Our hitting is what came through for us," she said. "We hit the ball well and played good defense."

The Wolverines (7-1 Big Ten, 28-9 overall) will need to continue their strong hitting performance as they head up I-96 today for a 2 p.m. twinbill with intrastate rival Michigan State (1-5, 17-12).

Against the Wildcats, freshman leftfielder Cathy Davie had no trouble warming her bat in the not-so-spring-like cold weather. She had five hits off of Northwestern pitching, including a rally-starting triple in Saturday's series opener with the Wolverines down 2-0. Michigan came back to win, 3-2.

Davie also got the game-winning RBI in Sunday's 6-0 victory with a first inning single.

Fellow freshman and first baseman Traci Conrad also warmed up the action with seven hits, six of which were singles.

Conrad attributed the team's performance at the plate to its patience.

"It helps when we just wait for our own pitches because then we just hit the ball a lot harder," Conrad said.

A Michigan-Michigan State matchup in any sport is usually a hot rivalry, but today's contest could be chilled by another cool spring day. The biting breeze of a Michigan spring, however, will be nothing new for either team today.

"This is the nature of the game," Michigan coach Carol Hutchins said during last weekend's breezy weekend series versus Northwestern.

"We don't look at the scoreboard and say, `There's a weather column,'" she continued. "You just play the game."

The players can't help but notice the absence of the burning summer sun usually associated with the softball diamond, but they do their best to ignore the conditions.

"The weather was a little cold," Davie said. "But I just went up to the heaters before I went up to bat."

The trick obviously worked against the Wildcats.

Despite their slow start in the conference season, the Spartans' statistics sheet shows that Michigan State is not a team to be taken lightly.

Senior third baseman Patti Raduenz is her own self-contained offensive machine. Playing in all of Michigan State's 29 games, she has a .506 batting average and has sent nine of her 43 hits out of the park.

In comparison, Michigan, as a team, has only five home runs, all hit by different Wolverines. The Spartans will hope that any brisk breeze today is heading out for the fences.

Raduenz is the Frank Thomas of the Spartans -- a slugger with a good eye. She has earned 12 free passes to first while striking out only nine times.

Michigan State's pitching has struggled in the last four games -- three of which were against conference front-runner Minnesota (5-0, 27-6) -- allowing five, seven, four and seven runs respectively.

For the season, though, the Spartans' team earned-run average is an impressive 1.85.

Stacey Smith (9-6, 1.5 ERA) and Stefanie Noffsinger (7-5, 2.05) are expected to take the mound for Michigan State today. The steady Wolverine pitching of sophomore Sara Griffin (16-4, 1.28) and junior Kelly Holmes (12-5, 1.47) will challenge the Spartans' duo.