No. 10 RAIDER SOFTBALL (21-8, 9-3 CCC)
2 p.m./4 p.m. Thursday – vs. Bushnell
11 a.m./1 p.m. Friday – vs. Bushnell
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ASHLAND – The No. 10-ranked Southern Oregon softball team hopes the top-heavy nature of the Cascade Conference is on display again this week as it seeks its fourth sweep in five series.

The Raiders (21-8 overall, 9-3 CCC) are set to play four against Bushnell (6-21, 1-11) at University Field, starting doubleheaders at 2 p.m. Thursday and 11 a.m. Friday at the halfway point of the circuit schedule. The top five teams in the standings have yet to drop a game against the bottom five, and SOU has been particularly merciless against such opponents while outscoring them 119-17 combined. The Raiders enter the week in fourth place – one game out of a tie for second and three behind first-place College of Idaho, which won't have played another top-four team until next week.

BRIEFLY:

• Senior third baseman Hannah Clavelle earned her first CCC Rize Laboratory Player of the Week honor following a near-perfect series at the plate against Providence. In SOU's four-game sweep of the Argos, Clavelle went 9-for-11 with a home run, two doubles, eight RBIs and four runs scored. She also drew five walks and was hit by a pitch, reaching base in 15 of 17 plate appearances. The performance raised her batting average from .288 to .357, and in 12 CCC games she is now 16-for-32 with 12 RBIs.
• In conference play, senior first baseman Jordan Henderson is 16-for-33 and tied for the league lead in both doubles (5) and home runs (3). Faith Moultrie, a junior left fielder, is third on the CCC-only hits leaderboard with 17.
• Senior pitcher Katie Machado tossed her 10th and 11th complete games of the season last week; no other pitcher in the conference has more than eight. She picked up wins in both and also notched her third save, dropping her ERA to 1.69. She leads the CCC in victories with an 11-3 record, and at 44-11 in her three-year career at SOU she is two wins away from moving into the No. 3 spot on the Raiders' all-time list.
• The Raiders have stolen 37 bases without being caught in conference play. Moultrie is 17-for-17 overall, ranking third in the conference in steals, and Kailer Fulton is 15-for-16.
• SOU has committed just 10 fielding errors over their last 18 games and accumulated more than one in only one of those.

ABOUT BUSHNELL: The Beacons enter the series losers of 15 of their last 16 games. They have two solid pitchers in Liz Hillier (2-8, 3.97 ERA) and Emily Cole (3-10, 4.07), but they're receiving limited run support from a lineup that is generating a .244 batting average. Faith Wayman (.368, 10 XBH) and Violet Richardson (.358, 10 XBH) are carrying the offensive load. The Raiders are 75-12 all-time against the Beacons and have won 26 consecutive matchups dating back to 2017, taking 17 of those by eight or more runs.