Bobcats host Conference Tournament

The Bobcats are looking to bring home their first conference tournament championship since 2018.

With Texas State hosting their first conference tournament since 2019, Head Coach Ricci Woodard has noticed a difference in energy with this season’s team compared to last season.

“I felt pretty decent going into the tournament last year,” Woodard said. “But there is a different feel with this group. I don’t know if it is experience or maybe we have been there and done that, or we are playing at home. But there is a different feeling.”

One of the reasons for that difference has been experience.

Texas State returned all the starters from last year’s team that qualified for the NCAA Tournament as an At-Large bid.

With a second year underneath their belt, starting pitcher Jessica Mullins has seen the growth of the team compared to last year.

“Obviously we are a more mature group,” Mullins said. “We have grown a lot mentally and physically. We have set ourselves up to win this thing.”

Being one of the older players on the team, having first played in 2020, third baseman Sara Vanderford has also seen the maturity jump from last year to now.

“It’s more comfortable all around,” Vanderford said. “It’s funny because we have the same team from last year, so why is it a different feeling, which is the million dollar question. But it’s been a year of trust, experience and relying on each other. With the adversity we have gone through, why not bet on us.”

Mullins said that maturity of the team is key and that will help the Bobcats in their hopes of winning their first tournament championship since 2018.

“This is part three of the season,” Mullins said. “The maturity has helped us know the game in and out. That has prepared us for not only taking on this tournament but the postseason in general.”

With the conference tournament acting as a third part of the season and single elimination, the level play about to take place at Bobcat Softball Stadium will be different with everyone’s seasons potentially on the line.

“Sometimes in the grand scheme of things, you forget that during the regular season you are still playing for something,” Vanderford said. “Whenever you get everybody in the same town, field and playing on the same day, different teams show up. Yes in the regular season you are still playing for something but in a tournament, you are working towards getting a bid. Everyone knows a different team has to show up, even though they shouldn’t but they do.”

Though the Bobcats will have the home field advantage, the road will not be an easy one for sure.

“We are more comfortable being home,” Mullins said. “But we need to make sure we know that everyone here is out to beat us. We have a target on our backs. We just need to play our game, take it one pitch at a time and keep an even keel.”

While the Bobcats look to take that even keel approach, Texas State will also lean on what has defined the program for so many years.

“Like Coach Woodard said, it’s about doing the little things right,” Vanderford said. “That is what this program falls back on. It is something that we have gotten away from a little bit in years past, but this group has put their head down and gone to work every single day while letting that work for us. Not taking it three games at a time but working back to taking it one pitch at a time and showing up for that one pitch. If we do that, we are good to go.”

Texas State will take the field tonight at 7 p.m. against the winner of Georgia Southern-Marshall.

cmcwilliams @sanmarcosrecord.com Twitter: @ColtonBMc