The LSU softball team set a school record with 52 home runs in 2003, but coach Yvette Girouard said do not expect that from this year’s team.
Girouard said at Thursday’s softball media day that the Tigers’ team speed coupled with a reduced core size and new bat regulations will force LSU to play small ball.
“We shattered every LSU home run record last year,” Girouard said. “Now we are back to a ball with a smaller core and the bats have been altered with also. I think you are going to go back to seeing a game that we kind of saw before where defense and pitching were a premium.”
Senior pitcher Kristin Schmidt will be called upon to duplicate her All-American season from a year ago. In 45 starts in 2003, Schmidt went 34-15, pitching 39 complete games and maintaining a 1.26 ERA.
“Our strength, not unlike every other previous LSU softball team, lies in pitching and defense,” Girouard said.
Girouard said Schmidt should get some help this season from freshman Emily Turner.
“I think [Turner] has the potential to be as good as she really wants to be,” Girouard said. “I haven’t coached an athlete ever that has worked this hard on her own. She is a tall, good looking kid that has all the God-given tools that fast-pitch pitchers need.”
Surrounding the circle will be the fastest group of position players Girouard has ever been around. Girouard said this year’s squad will be able to get more done on the base path than in year’s past.
“Our one through nine in the lineup can really run,” Girouard said. “Last season we were pretty much station-to-station. We had too many people in our lineup that we could not do too much with on the base path even if we tried to hit and run.”
LSU will get a chance to show off its speed and experience in the first two weeks of the season as it plays two Top 10 teams, Oklahoma and California.
“We start of with a bang, the very first weekend we have the No. 4 team coming in here in the country,” Girouard said. “So immediately we are thrown in the fire.”
Schmidt said playing tough non-conference games early will get LSU ready for the long Southeastern Conference schedule.
“We are definitely ready to take [Oklahoma and California] on,” Schmidt said. “We definitely talk about that at practice every day that Oklahoma is coming here and we are going to be playing top teams in the country right away.”
The Tigers enter the season ranked No. 15, a far cry from the No. 3 ranking in the preseason last season. Schmidt said the expectations were to lofty and placed a bit of pressure on them.
“I think there is less pressure than last season,” Schmidt said. “But we definitely want to be the best we can be because we want to represent LSU.”
The Tigers begin their season with the Tiger Classic from Feb. 6-8 at Tiger Park.