April 18, 2012

TEMPE, Ariz. - The No. 4/3 Arizona State softball squad (36-5, 8-2 Pac-12) gets back to conference play after a bye week with a three-game series against the No. 16/19 Stanford Cardinal (32-13, 6-9 Pac-12). Join us at Farrington Stadium as we only have two more weekends at home during regular-season action!

Friday's game is the softball program's Gold Game. Wear Gold!

The contests will mark the fifth-consecutive series against a Top 25-ranked team for the Devils, who are 9-4 against ranked opponents. Action kicks off against the Cardinal on Friday night at 7 p.m., then continues Saturday at 7 p.m. and Sunday at 12 p.m.

FOLLOW THE SUN DEVILS LIVE
All three games this weekend will be streamed live on FoxSportsArizona.com as well as The Blaze 1330 AM's UStream channel, here. Live stats and play-by-play will also be available on Gametracker. All links can be found in the sidebar on the Arizona State softball schedule page, which is found here.

VOTE FOR BOYD FOR THE LOWE'S SENIOR CLASS AWARD | Vote Here
Katelyn Boyd has been chosen as one of 10 finalists for the 2012 Lowe's Senior CLASS Award. To be eligible for the award, a student-athlete must be classified as an NCAA Division I senior and have notable achievements in four areas of excellence - community, classroom, character and competition. Vote every day for Katelyn here.

PREVIOUSLY FOR THE DEVILS
Most recently, Arizona State played a midweek series against the No. 25/23 Oregon State Beavers, splitting the weekend after the third game was canceled. The loss, which came in nine innings, was only the second game to stretch to extra frames in the conference season.

SCOUTING THE CARDINAL
Stanford (32-13, 6-9 Pac-12) is coming fresh off of a sweep of Oregon State and a loss to San Jose State on Tuesday night. Freshman infielder Hanna Winter leads the squad in batting average at .453. Junior right-hander Teagan Gerhart, who is throwing a 2.51 ERA on a 27-8 record, leads the bullpen. Arizona State is 45-24 against the Cardinal all-time, with the series dating back to 1984. 

CLOTHING DRIVE AT SOFTBALL, MAY 4-6
The weekend of May 4-6 the softball team will have a table set up at Farrington Stadium to accept donations for Helen's Hope Chest throughout the weekend as the Sun Devils take on Utah in the season home finale. Senior designated player Nikole Afusia is an intern at Helen's Hope Chest - we invite you to learn more about this event here.