Ehren Earleywine congratulations Maryville, MO. native Taylor Gadbois in a game earlier this season. (photo/Mizzou Athletics)
Mizzou Softball head coach, and Jefferson City, Mo. native, Ehren Earleywine earned his 500th career victory in the first game of Wednesday’s doubleheader–a 4-2 win over Western Illinois. The 16th ranked Tigers completed the sweep with a 5-0 win in the second game.
Tori Finucane started the first game allowed only an earned run in the first. From the second through the fourth inning, Finucane only walked two. She finished the day pitching a complete game (7.0 IP), her team-high 12th of the year, allowing the one earned run on five hits and two walks while striking out five to improve her record to 13-5.
Casey Stangel was in the circle in the second game for the Tigers and threw her 11th complete game of the season and the shutout was her third of 2014. She allowed three hits, while striking out three and walking none.
Earleywine’s teams have been ranked in the Top 10 for five straight seasons, including as high as No. 3 in the nation during a three-week run in 2010. Mizzou has finished as a Top 10 team in the polls three times under Earleywine’s leadership. He was named Missouri’s head coach in August of 2006, and was rewarded with a seven-year contract extension on Aug. 31, 2011, making him the first Olympic coach in Missouri history to receive an extension greater than five years.
In seven seasons, the three-time conference coach of the year has become the first Missouri softball coach to lead his squad to six-straight NCAA Regional titles, doing so on the road in 2008 and again at home in Columbia, Mo., from 2009-13. In fact, Mizzou is currently one of only three schools in the country to win six-straight regional titles.
The Tigers are back in action at No. 20 Auburn in Auburn, Ala., to kick off a three-game series from Friday, April 11-Sunday, April 13.
