JACKRABBITS MAKE D-I TOURNAMENT DEBUT

Friday, May 21

Fayetteville, Ark.

4:30 p.m.

South Dakota State University

Stanford

Photo by: Dave Eggen/Inertia

5/19/2021 9:00:00 AM | Softball

South Dakota State (42-6) at NCAA Division I Softball Championship -- Fayetteville Regional

When	Friday-Sunday, May 21-23 • May 21 vs. Stanford (31-20), 2:30 p.m. • Remainder of schedule to be determined (double-elimination tournament)
Where	Bogle Park \| Fayetteville, Arkansas
TV	ESPN3.com
Radio	None
Live Stats	NCAA.com
Game Notes	South Dakota State \| Stanford \| Arkansas \| Manhattan \| The Summit League
Social Media	Twitter \| Instagram \| #GRIT

Postseason play for the South Dakota State University softball team will continue in uncharted waters as the Jackrabbits will be making their first-ever appearance in the NCAA Division I Softball Championship.

The Jackrabbits, who won both the Summit League regular season and tournament titles, have been assigned to the Fayetteville (Ark.) Regional, where they will face Stanford in opening-round action Friday afternoon. SDSU enters the matchup with a 42-6 overall record, including a stretch in which the Jackrabbits have won 29 of their last 31 games. Stanford, which is receiving votes in the national polls, earned an at-large selection with a 31-20 overall mark.

First pitch is set for 2:30 p.m. at Bogle Park on the University of Arkansas campus. Video coverage is slated to be available on ESPN3.com.

Host Arkansas, which earned the No. 6 national seed, will face Manhattan in Friday's other opening-round game at noon.

The four-team regional will consist of a double-elimination format over three days.

The full schedule follows:
Friday, May 21
Game 1 – Manhattan (22-14) at Arkansas (40-9), noon [SEC Network]
Game 2 – South Dakota State (42-6) vs. Stanford (31-20), 2:30 p.m. [ESPN3.com]
Saturday, May 22
Game 3 – Game 1 winner vs. Game 2 winner, TBA
Game 4 – Game 1 loser vs. Game 2 loser, TBA
Game 5 – Game 3 loser vs. Game 4 winner, TBA
Sunday, May 23
Game 6 - Game 3 winner vs. Game 5 winner, TBA
Game 7 - Game 6 winner vs. Game 6 loser (if necessary), TBA

POSTSEASON HISTORY: Although South Dakota State is making its first NCAA Division Softball Championship appearance, the Jackrabbits do have recent postseason experience.

SDSU earned back-to-back berths in the National Invitational Softball Championship in both 2018 and 2019, compiling a combined 4-4 record. The Jackrabbits advanced to the 2018 regional championship in Greeley, Colorado, falling twice to Loyola Marymount after two victories over Colorado State and one over LMU.

In 2019, the Jackrabbits made the trek to Ames, Iowa, for the NISC. After downing Eastern Kentucky, 8-6, in the opening round, SDSU was eliminated after consecutive losses to Iowa State (2-7) and Purdue (1-4).

In addition, SDSU made one postseason appearance at the NCAA Division II level, hosting and finishing as runner-up in the 1996 Central Regional.

THE SERIES: South Dakota State has played a total of one game against the rest of the field at the Fayetteville Regional. That contest was during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, when the Jackrabbits dropped a 13-3, five-inning decision Feb. 21, 2020, at Arkansas.

SDSU opened the scoring with a two-run double by Caelyn Christiancy in the top of the first inning, but Arkansas responded with four runs in the home half of the inning, highlighted by a three-run homer by Linnie Malkin.

Lindsey Culver accounted for the third and final Jackrabbit run with a solo homer to lead off the bottom of the season.

The Jackrabbits did win their other four games on the weekend at Bogle Park, notching two wins over Montana, as well as recording victories over Boston University and Marist.

SHORT HOPS: Following are some quick notes regarding the South Dakota State softball team so far this season:

SDSU has won 12 games this season by putting the eight-run run into effect;
The Jackrabbits have set a new single-season school record with 70 home runs in 48 games — the previous record of 53 home runs (in 57 games) was set in 2016;
SDSU had its streak of consecutive games with a home run end at 17 in the second game of a May 7 doubleheader against North Dakota State;
Eleven different Jackrabbit players have hit a home run this season and SDSU homered in 24 of 27 games against Summit League foes (regular season and conference tournament);
SDSU ranks 15th among Division I programs with an average of 1.46 home runs per game;
The Jackrabbits tied a Division I-era (since 2005) single-game record with five home runs in Game 1 of the April 2 doubleheader at Western Illinois and went on to hit 13 homers in the four-game series;
SDSU ranks ninth nationally with a .575 team slugging percentage;
With an average of 6.52 runs scored per game, the Jackrabbits rank 14th among Division I squads, while their .324 team batting average ranks 18th;
SDSU has not lost back-to-back games this season and has yet to be shut out;
Six Jackrabbit regulars enter the week hitting .300 or better, led by freshmen Jocelyn Carrillo and Emma Osmundson, who are hitting .427 and .374 respectively;
In Summit League play, Jackrabbit opponents scored runs in 25 separate innings, but SDSU answered with at least one run of their own in the next half-inning 16 times;
The Jackrabbits put together a streak of nine consecutive errorless games from March 6-12 and rank 13th nationally with a .977 team fielding percentage;
In the pitching department, South Dakota State ranks 16th in team earned run average at 1.86 and 19th in shutouts with 15;
SDSU is 8-0 in one-run games this season, winning five of those games in its last at-bat.

40-WIN MARK: South Dakota State has reached the 40-win plateau for only the second time in program history. With a 42-6 record entering NCAA postseason play, the Jackrabbits are one win away from tying the school record for most wins in a season.

Earlier this year, the Jackrabbits hit the 30-win mark the sixth time in program history and the third time in the last four seasons under head coach Krista Wood.

SDSU first reached the 30-win mark in 1996, recording the school-record 43 wins against 22 losses. The Jackrabbits went 31-19 in 1997 and then went without a 30-win season until posting a 30-29 record in 2005 as the program began the transition from NCAA Division II to Division I.

The Jackrabbits tallied back-to-back 37-win seasons in 2018 (37-18) and 2019 (37-19) in making consecutive appearances in the National Invitational Softball Championship.

EYE ON THE RPI: The Jackrabbits stand not only atop the Summit League, but have built themselves a solid national profile heading into tournament action.

In the May 17 RPI rankings released by the NCAA, SDSU ranked 37th out of 290 Division I teams to have played a game this season, a move up two spots from the previous week. The next closest Summit League team was Kansas City at 128.

The Jackrabbits have a combined 3-3 record against other teams in the 64-team tournament field: Wichita State (1-1); Iowa State (0-1), and Northern Iowa (2-1). SDSU had games scheduled in February against Oklahoma State and Texas canceled due to weather.

SUMMIT LEAGUE AWARDS: Summit League regular season champion South Dakota State swept the major award categories and placed nine players on the 2021 All-Summit League Softball Team, which was announced May 11.

Returning freshman Cylie Halvorson was selected as the Summit League Player of the Year, while the Jackrabbit pitching tandem of Tori Kniesche and Grace Glanzer were honored as Summit League Pitcher of the Year and Freshman of the Year, respectively. In addition, Krista Wood was named Summit League Coach of the Year.

Halvorson, a first baseman from Sioux Falls, finished the regular season as the league leader in home runs (16), runs batted in (51), total bases (109) and slugging percentage (.779), while her .357 batting average ranked fifth. She played errorless in the field, handling 248 total chances without a miscue in 43 starts at first base.

Halvorson is the second Jackrabbit to be named Summit League Player of the Year, joining Brittney Morse in 2018.

Kniesche, a freshman from Wayne, Nebraska, burst onto the scene this season, leading the league in both wins (19) and earned run average (1.50). During the regular season, Kniesche limited the opposition to a .139 batting average and struck out 158 batters in 107 innings pitched. She won her last 15 decisions en route to a 19-1 record, with one save.

Highlighting Kniesche's season thus far were a pair of five-inning no-hitters in the span of a week – April 24 versus South Dakota and April 30 against Creighton.
The right-hander is the first Jackrabbit hurler to be honored as Summit League Pitcher of the Year.

Glanzer finished right behind Kniesche in both ERA (1.86) and wins in compiling a 16-3 record through the regular season. A returning freshman from Sioux Falls, Glanzer tied with Kniesche for the league lead with five shutouts, which included a March 5 no-hitter against Oregon State and a pair of one-hitters. Glanzer tossed a team-high 139 innings and turned in league-best 18 complete games, striking out 94 batters and limiting opposing batters to a .188 average.

Ali Herdliska in 2016 is the only other Jackrabbit softball player to be honored as Summit League Freshman of the Year.

The trio of Halvorson, Glanzer and Kniesche were joined on the all-Summit League First Team by five other Jackrabbits. On the infield, catcher Allison Yoder and second baseman Lindsey Culver were both named to the first team in a vote among the league's seven head coaches.

Yoder, a sophomore from Urbandale, Iowa, settled into the starting catching role midway through the season and displayed a consistent bat, hitting .301 with seven doubles, four triples and 12 runs batted in.

Culver, a returning freshman from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, recorded a .298 batting average with seven home runs and 24 RBIs in 39 games. She finished the regular season with a .596 slugging percentage.

The designated player spot was filled by SDSU's Kelsey Lenox. The junior from Chesterfield, Missouri, batted .350 with a team-high 10 doubles and ranked second on the team with nine home runs and 42 RBIs.

All three of SDSU's starting outfielders received all-league honors, including first-team selections Jocelyn Carrillo and Emma Osmundson. Carrillo, a returning freshman from Palmdale, California, was the team's top hitter in league play and took over the overall team and league lead in batting average on the final weekend of the regular season to check in at .409 entering the postseason. In patrolling center field, Carrillo ranked second in the league with a .764 slugging percentage, tallying eight home runs and 30 RBIs. Her .492 on-base percentage also paced the conference.

Osmundson, a true freshman from Sioux Falls, ranked second on the team and in the league with a .391 batting average, adding five triples, three home runs and 19 RBIs. She posted a .635 slugging percentage in 41 games and also ranked second among Summit League players with a .482 on-base percentage.

Completing the Jackrabbit outfield triumvirate is junior left fielder Peyton Daugherty, who was honored on the second team. The Ankeny, Iowa, product ranked second in the league with 53 hits, 38 runs scored and 17 stolen bases while hitting out of the leadoff spot. She batted .358 in regular season play.

The Summit League Coach of the Year award is the second for Wood, who also earned the honor in 2018.

Wood led SDSU to its first-ever conference title in softball during the 2021 regular season, posting a 38-5 overall record and matching a Summit League record for conference wins with a 21-1 mark in league play. The Jackrabbits won a school-record 16 games during the season and had won 25 of their last 26 games entering postseason competition.

All-Tournament Team
Jocelyn Carrillo was named Most Valuable Player of the Summit League Softball Championship and four other Jackrabbits were honored on the all-tournament team. Carrillo batted a team-best .571 (8-for-14) with three home runs, two doubles and six runs batted in over the five-game tournament stretch. She also stole a pair of bases and scored five runs.

Key stats for the other all-tournament selections included:

Rozelyn Carrillo (.333 avg. (5-for-15), 2 doubles);
Grace Glanzer (2-1 record, 0.44 ERA, 2 shutouts, 16 innings pitched);
Tori Kniesche (2-0 record, 2.06 ERA, 1 shutout, 20 strikeouts in 17 innings pitched);
Kelsey Lenox (.286 avg. (4-for-14), 2 home runs, 5 RBIs, 4 runs scored).

FANTASTIC FRESHMEN: South Dakota State's Cylie Halvorson and Tori Kniesche have been in the running for the 2021 Schutt Sports/NFCA Division I National Freshman of the Year award, association officials announced in late April.

SDSU was one of three programs to have two players among the 30 players on the initial watch list, joining Arizona and Oklahoma.

Due to last year's season being canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, candidates hail from both the 2020 and 2021 freshman classes.

Kniesche, a true freshman from Wayne, Nebraska, has since been named one of 15 semifinalists for the award. She has posted a 21-1 record with one save so far this season and has won her last 17 decisions, including pitching a pair of five-inning no-hitters in late April. The right-hander has compiled a 1.58 earned run average with six shutouts, including the two no-hitters April 24 versus South Dakota and April 30 against Creighton.

Her 178 strikeouts — in only 124 innings — currently rank fifth on the SDSU single-season charts. Kniesche, who had a streak of 23 consecutive innings with a strikeout end in her May 7 start against North Dakota State, is limiting the opposition to a .148 batting average, which would stand as the lowest single-season mark on record in program history.

The freshman has tallied double figures in strikeouts in nine starts, including 10 K's in the conference-championship-clinching game May 15 against Omaha. Her 17-game personal winning streak began March 10, when she tossed five innings of relief in the first game of a doubleheader at Kansas.

A returning freshman from Sioux Falls, Halvorson leads the Jackrabbits — and The Summit League — in numerous offensive categories, including home runs (17) and runs batted in (54). She is slugging .753, is batting .351 and has played errorless defense at first base in starting all 48 games.

Halvorson's 17 home runs are a new Jackrabbit single-season standard this season and rank 16th nationally, while her 54 RBIs rank ninth. She now stands second on the SDSU single-season charts with her 54 RBIs, trailing Brittney Morse (61 in 2018).

The 2021 Schutt Sports/NFCA?Division I National Freshman of the Year award will be presented prior to the start of the 2021 NCAA Women's College World Series in Oklahoma City.

PLAYERS OF THE WEEK: SDSU dominated the Summit League weekly awards in 2021, with seven different players honored during the course of the season.

Five different Jackrabbits were named Summit League Player of the Week, while pitchers Tori Kniesche and Grace Glanzer combined for six Pitcher of the Week accolades.

Glanzer, a returning freshman from Sioux Falls, claimed her third weekly award by closing out the regular season with 12 shutout innings over two starts in a weekend home series against North Dakota State. In her May 7 start, Glanzer carried a no-hitter into the seventh inning before finishing with a one-hit shutout. The right-hander struck out four and walked two.

In her final appearance of the regular season on May 8, Glanzer worked the first five innings, again blanking the Bison while surrendering three hits and striking out three. She improved to 16-3 on the season and lowered her earned run average to 1.86.

Glanzer also received the award March 8 and April 19.

GOOD THINGS HAPPEN IN THREES: South Dakota State accomplished a rare feat in the sixth inning of its Feb. 12 season opener against Iowa State — hitting three triples in the same inning. Jocelyn Carrillo started the parade of three-baggers with a leadoff triple and pinch-hitter Emma Osmundson followed two batters later with a triple in her first collegiate at-bat. Peyton Daugherty then stepped to the plate and made it three triples in four at-bats in the inning, lining one to the right-center gap to plate Osmundson with what was then the tying run.

Osmundson has taken over the team lead with six triples to tie a single-season school record and rank in a tie for eighth nationally in that category, while Lindsey Culver, Allison Yoder and Jocelyn Carrillo each have four triples.

As a team, the Jackrabbits have combined for 25 triples to break the program's previous single-season mark of 24 set in 1985. SDSU currently leads Division I teams this season with an average of 0.52 triples per game.

NO-HITTER HISTORY: South Dakota State's co-aces Grace Glanzer and Tori Kniesche have each pitched a no-hitter this season, marking the second year in a row a Jackrabbit pitcher has accomplished the feat.

Glanzer's no-hitter came against Oregon State on March 5 in Greeley, Colorado, while Kniesche tossed five-inning no-nos versus South Dakota on April 24 and against Creighton on April 30. Kniesche joined Meggan Staton (2003) as the only Jackrabbit with more than one no-hitter in both a season and career.

Morgan DeMarais hurled a no-hitter March 8, 2020, against Merrimack, in a game played in Madeira Beach, Florida. DeMarais struck out seven and did not walk a batter, missing out on a perfect game due to two hit batters and a Jackrabbit error.

The no-hitters by Glanzer and Kniesche are the sixth, seventh and eighth on record in program history; the others:

Jessica Jones, April 24, 1990, versus Nebraska-Omaha (W, 1-0);
Melissa Alleven, March 29, 2002, versus Northern State (W, 17-1; 5 inn.);
Meggan Staton, March 3, 2003, vs. Rollins (W, 1-0; 8 inn.);
Meggan Staton, March 6, 2003, vs. Lynn (W, 5-0);
Morgan DeMarais, March 8, 2020, vs. Merrimack (W, 12-0).

A returning freshman from Sioux Falls, Glanzer nearly duplicated her feat March 19 against Northern Colorado, taking a no-hit bid into the fifth — and final — inning, as well as another no-hit bid into the seventh inning of the Jackrabbits' series opener May 7 against North Dakota State.

Glanzer has posted a complete game in 20 of her 24 starts this season with five shutouts.

DAUGHERTY SETS THE TABLE: Jackrabbit outfielder Peyton Daugherty has filled the leadoff role for the SDSU offense throughout the season and reached a pair of milestones during the four-game sweep of Kansas City March 27-28.

A junior from Ankeny, Iowa, Daugherty played in her 100th career game in the first game of the March 28 doubleheader and also recorded her 100th career hit in the same contest. She also has moved into sixth place in career stolen bases at SDSU with 45 after tallying two steals in the Summit League Softball Championship.

For her career, Daugherty is 45-of-47 in stolen-base attempts, including a team-best 19-for-20 in that department so far this season.

Daugherty currently leads the team with 61 hits and 41 runs, tallying a team-best 18 multi-hit games. In the two-game championship series against Omaha May 15, Daugherty went 6-for-6 (3-for-3 in each game) and scored three runs.

TWO-HOME RUN GAMES: Kelsey Lenox's two-home run game to open an April 10-11 weekend series against Omaha marked the third time in a five-game span that a Jackrabbit player hit multiple round-trippers in a game.

A week earlier, in both games of an April 2 doubleheader at Western Illinois, SDSU second baseman Lindsey Culver homered twice. At that point, Culver owned each of the last three multi-home run games by a Jackrabbit player; she was the lone SDSU player with a two-homer game during the abbreviated 2020 season, accomplishing the feat March 8 of that year against Merrimack.

Lenox turned in another two-homer performance in the first game of the May 15 Summit League tournament championship series against Omaha. She homered in each of the first two innings of Game 1, connecting on a grand slam to open the scoring and adding a solo homer following a three-run blast by Cylie Halvorson in the second.

Jocelyn Carrillo recorded the first two-homer game by a Jackrabbit in the tournament, connecting twice in the May 14 elimination game against Kansas City. She set the tone with a three-run homer in the first and added a two-run shot in the fifth to account for five of SDSU's seven runs.

SISTER ACT: Sisters and Palmdale, California, natives Rozelyn and Jocelyn Carrillo have both put up impressive numbers so far this season in solidifying spots in the Jackrabbit starting lineup.

Jocelyn, the team's starting center fielder and a first-team all-Summit League selection, was the team's top hitter in April, batting at a .512 clip (22-for-43) in 16 games with six homers and 17 runs batted in. Her current .831 slugging percentage for the season is on pace to shatter the previous single-season mark of .725 set by Ali Herdliska in 2016, as is her .503 on-base percentage (.500 by Abbey Murphy in 2018).

Jocelyn also has been one of the squad's top clutch hitters this season, highligthed by a pair of go-ahead home runs: in the top of the 10th inning of the Jackrabbits' 15-11 victory at Kansas on March 10 and in the top of the seventh inning of SDSU's 3-2 win in the first game of an April 3 doubleheader at Western Illinois.

Rozelyn, who joined her older sister on the all-tournament team at the Summit League Softball Championship, ranks fifth on the squad with six home runs and is hitting at a .299 clip, while tallying 25 runs batted in. She also has performed well at the shortstop position, committing only four errors in 138 total chances.

COACH WOOD: Krista Wood is in her seventh season as head coach at South Dakota State in 2021.

Already the program's winningest coach with a 196-149 record after being hired to lead the program in August of 2014, Wood boasts a 466-303 overall career record after eight successful seasons at Wayne State College.

She has coached five NFCA All-Midwest Region selections (the first four in SDSU's Division I era) and 27 All-Summit League selections in her time at SDSU, including two Summit League Freshmen of the Year (Ali Herdliska-2016, Grace Glanzer-2021), a pair of Players of the Year (Brittney Morse-2018, Cylie Halvorson-2021) and the first Pitcher of the Year in program history (Tori Kniesche-2021). Herdliska is the only Jackrabbit to earn All-Summit League honors four times in her career, and twice picked up an NFCA All-Midwest Region nod.

The Jackrabbits have won 20 or more games five times under coach Wood, and prior to the cancellation of the 2020 Summit League Championships had reached the league's year-end tournament in each of her first five seasons, including a championship series run in 2018.

SDSU won 37 games in back-to-back 2018 and 2019 seasons, earning berths in the National Invitational Softball Championship both seasons. Wood was named the Summit League's Coach of the Year in 2018 while guiding her team to a then-program-record .673 winning percentage, breaking the 35-win mark for the second time in history.

Her 2020 squad won 15 games and posted a Summit League-best.652 winning percentage before COVID-19 precautions ended the NCAA's Division I softball season nationwide.

The 2021 season has been a historic one for Wood and her program as the Jackrabbits earned the first regular season conference title in program history, posting a 21-1 mark in Summit League play. The Jackrabbits strung together a school-record 16-game winning streak and closed the regular season with a 38-5 overall record after winning 25 of their final 26 contests.

Wood put together a 270-154 mark at Wayne State, turning the Wildcat program into a winner after inheriting a 10-win squad when she was hired before the 2007 season. She brought WSC to three consecutive NCAA Division II National Tournaments between 2009-11, including a 2010 NCAA Central Region crown. The Wildcats won a school-record 43 games during that season and claimed the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference tournament title.

Wood coached internationally during the summer of 2009, leading a United States team (sponsored by USA Athletes International) at the Oldenzaal Invitational in Holland.

A native of Missouri Valley, Iowa, Wood spent two seasons as an assistant coach at St. Cloud State University after a stellar playing career at Nebraska-Omaha from 1999-2003. She helped the Mavericks to the NCAA Division II national championship in 2001 as a sophomore and finished her career as the all-time winningest pitcher in Maverick softball history with 106 wins and 530 career strikeouts.

Wood was named to Omaha's athletic hall of fame in 2020.

In the 2001 national championship game, Wood tossed a two-hit shutout with five strikeouts in a 4-0 win over Lewis University. She also ranks second in career shutouts at UNO with 43, and earned numerous honors as a player at UNO, earning First Team All-NCC honors three times, while also collecting three All-NCC Academic Team awards. She earned NFCA All-Region First Team honors in 2002 and a Second Team All-Region selection in 2001. Wood also earned North Central Conference Freshman of the Year in 2000.

Wood also coached at the high school level, serving as the pitching coach at Omaha Gross High School in the fall of 2003 and at state-qualifying Omaha Westside High School in 2004.

Wood earned a Bachelor of Science degree in physical education K-12 with an endorsement in coaching from the University of Nebraska-Omaha in 2004 and received a master's degree in sport management in 2006 from St. Cloud State University.

THE ROSTER: The 2021 SDSU softball roster features 23 players from six different states and one foreign country. Of the 23 players, seven are from South Dakota, four hail from Iowa and California and three are Nebraska natives. Two players call Minnesota and Missouri home. The international player hails from Italy.

By class, two are seniors, seven are juniors, four are sophomores and 10 are freshmen (five returning and five incoming).

A LOOK AHEAD: The winner of the Fayetteville Regional will advance to Super Regional play May 28-30 at campus sites.

-GoJacks.com-