The Gators welcome the Bulls to Katie Seashole Pressly Stadium for a doubleheader that is scheduled to start at 6 p.m. ET.
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – The 13th-ranked Florida softball team briefly steps out of Southeastern Conference action with a midweek doubleheader Wednesday at 6 p.m. against USF. The first game of the twin-billing will air on ESPNU, while the second will start roughly 30 minutes after with an audio stream only broadcast.
The Gators (31-11) and the Bulls (27-18) were originally scheduled to play opening weekend, but weather conditions forced the game to be moved to tomorrow after the originally scheduled contest at 6 p.m.
Florida is coming off its third SEC series victory of the season as the Orange & Blue took the series over No. 12 Georgia, 2-1, in front of three sold out crowds. Overall, a series record 7,168 fans poured into KSP Stadium for the Top-15 conference series and it was also the first time in program history that all three games of a series was sold out.
Redshirt-junior Skylar Wallace played at an elite level to help the Gators take the first two games of the series 13-4 (6 innings) and 8-7 in game two. The Woodstock, Ga. native was 6-for-7 (.857) in the series with four home runs, eight RBI, six runs scored, six walks and was 3-for-3 on stolen bases.
The trio of performances coupled with her midweek effort against UNF landed the talented shortstop her third SEC Player of the Week award in addition to being named the national Louisville Slugger/NFCA Player of the Week.
In addition to Wallace, the Gators offense is well supported by Kendra Falby (.408), Charla Echols (.367), Reagan Walsh (.345), Pal Egan (.327), Sam Roe (.318) and Avery Goelz (.311) who are all batting over .300 this season.
As a team, Florida is batting .333 on the year which ranks first in the SEC and 10th nationally, while the offense also ranks sixth nationally in scoring (7.12 rpg), third in on base percentage (.437), fifth in walks (.173) and 10th in slugging percentage (.553).
USF enters the midweek affair on a five-game win streak that includes a pair of wins over Stetson, 2-1 & 13-1 (6), along with a series sweep of Tulsa, 7-0, 2-1 (8) and 5-4, the previous weekend.
Offensively, the Bulls are batting .249 (277-of-1,112) and are led by Marissa Trivelpiece who is hitting a team-best .301. In the circle, Payton Dixon leads the staff with a 1.47 ERA over 90 2/3 innings pitched and has held opposing batters to a .210 average at the plate.
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