CARBONDALE, Ill. – Coming off of a season in which Southern had won nine-straight and 15 of its last 16 games before the season was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Southern Illinois University softball team has released its 2021 regular season schedule Thursday.
Head coach Kerri Blaylock returns for her 22nd season at the helm of the Saluki softball program. Southern went 15-6 a year ago and were leading the Missouri Valley Conference in fielding percentage (.977), fewest runs allowed (66) and were second in earned run average (2.77) before the season was brought to a halt.
“I feel like our schedule definitely challenges us,” Blaylock said. “It also gives us an opportunity to play a bunch of people and tinker with our lineup. When we play five games in a weekend, it will allow us to play different sets of people. It’s important for us to get our freshmen playing time as well as our sophomores, who’s first-year was cut short. So we need to get everyone adjusted and comfortable before the start of conference play.”
Blaylock and her staff went to work on the 2021 schedule last April, shortly after the 2020 season was cancelled. SIU’s all-time winningest softball coach, who enters the 2021 season 31 wins shy of breaking Itchy Jones’ school record for most wins by a head coach of any sport, was able to piece together a 52-game slate for 2021, which features 24 home games and five tournaments.
“We started to change the schedule in April to eliminate trips where we would need to fly,” Blaylock said. “We were originally planning to fly to both Texas and North Carolina. We decided instead to go with places we could drive to. It’s been an easy adjustment for us because the opponents we were scheduled to play at our away tournaments aren’t opting out- it’s been more our home tournaments that need adjusted. Other than that, scheduling has gone rather smoothy.”
The 2021 season begins on Feb. 12 with the Southern Mississippi Tournament, where Southern will join Southern Mississippi, North Dakota, Northern Illinois and Murray State for the three-day tournament. The Salukis will return to Mississippi the following weekend, when they travel to Starkville, Miss. to take part in the Mississippi State Tournament. SIU will take on the hosts, the Bulldogs, as well as Merrimack and Stephen F. Austin.
The Salukis will then return home to host the Coach B Classic on Feb. 26-28. Southern will welcome DePaul, Ball State, Saint Louis and Austin Peay for the three-day event. The second home tournament for Southern will take place March 5-7 and will include games against St. Louis, UIC, Creighton and Northern Kentucky. The following weekend on March 12-14, Southern will again head south to the UAB Tournament in Birmingham, Ala. where they will tangle with Ball State, UAB and Samford.
“In years past you could schedule based on our opponents RPI or based on places you want to take your kids as a sort of reward trip,” Blaylock said. “This year we were much more limited but we did pick up some good tournaments. Mississippi State will give us a Top-25 type of matchup while the Southern Mississippi and the UAB tournaments are both full of good mid-majors that will give us a really good mixture of opponents.”
The Salukis play the next eight games in the friendly confines of Charlotte West Stadium, as they will open conference play on March 20-21 with a three-game series against the back-to-back MVC champion Drake Bulldogs. Southern will then host Missouri State for a midweek doubleheader on March 24, before welcoming the Bradley Braves for three games on March 27-28.
SIU opens April with three games at Loyola on April 2-3 before returning to Carbondale to host Evansville on April 10-11. The Salukis will play the next seven games on the road, beginning with a road trip to Illinois State on April 17-18, followed by a single game at Missouri State on April 21 and three at Indiana State on April 24-25.
The Salukis will play their final home series of 2021 on May 1-2 when they host Valparaiso. That weekend will also serve as senior day for Southern’s five seniors. SIU will conclude the regular season with a road trip to Northern Iowa on May 7-8.
“For a COVID year, I think we did pretty well with our schedule. We were suppose to play Northwestern and Illinois this season, but the Big Ten conferences opted out of non-conference games because of COVID. We were also scheduled to play Mizzou. But hopefully next year and in the future we will be able to pick those games back up.
The 2021 MVC Softball Tournament is set for May 12-15 at Cooper Stadium on the campus of the University of Evansville.
NCAA Regional dates are set for May 21-23 with Super Regionals following May 27-30. The Women’s College World Series, held in Oklahoma City, will be held June 3-9.
