Ryan Shumaker, Athletic Communications
ALVA, Okla. – The Northwestern Oklahoma State softball team will look to move even farther up the Great American Conference standings as they continue to come together as one following the most impressive series in recent memory.

The Rangers traveled to #3 Southern Arkansas and shocked the perennial power of the GAC by taking two games on their home field. The 2-2 series split moved the Rangers into a tie for eighth place in the GAC standings, and with the next 16 games for the Rangers coming against teams with the same or worse than conference record than the Rangers, interim head coach Jill Webb is looking forward to watching her team continue to grow and succeed as the second half of the season carries on.

"Before we were talking about the game to game and just figuring things out but now we have gotten ourselves in a position where we have to look at the bigger picture the next few weeks in order to reach our goal of making the conference tournament," said coach Webb.

Coach Webb has attributed the recent success to simply coming together as a team and trusting each player to do their job. This new mindset has shown the most success in the circle for the Rangers as the staff as a whole has been phenomenal during the past three series where the Rangers have accumulated a record of 7-5. Starters Madison Garza and Karly Murray as well as the relief efforts of freshman Kendall Jones held the explosive Southern Arkansas offense to under three runs in three of the four contests this weekend. The staff's performance knocked the Muleriders out of the top spot in the batting average category for the conference.

"The past couple of weekends our staff has been doing a great job of holding teams to a lot less scores, and with a team like Southern Arkansas we caught them off-guard and they were on their heels and we just attacked," said coach Webb.

The timely batting the Rangers have used to compliment the outstanding pitching efforts of Garza and Murray began to evolve into a consistent threat in the two wins this weekend as the Rangers managed six and eight hits against statistically the second best pitching team in the conference. No batters have stuck out individually in the past three series, but a combination of that previously mentioned timely hitting as well as a solid team defense has allowed the Rangers to continue to provide their pitchers with just enough support to get the job done.

This weekend the Rangers will hit the road to take on Oklahoma Baptist, who are coming off of two quality wins in their last conference outing against Arkansas Tech despite their struggles thus far this season. The doubleheaders are set to begin on Friday at 4 p.m. and then on Saturday afternoon at 12 p.m. As coach Webb and her team know the next few series will be crucial for not just the determination if the Rangers make the conference tournament, but for the seeding in the tournament as well.

"These girls have been working so hard and to see them together out on the field win or lose right now it's just fun to see the changes they have been able to make and we just want to keep it going," coach Webb said, "It's been a phenomenal season so far."

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