The first tournament, Conway (The Coastal Carolina University softball team) will take part in, will be in Jacksonville. It is called River City Leadoff tournament and there will be 3 teams in total. Conway will play there against NC State and Kansas. In the upcoming season 2016, The Chanticleers will host 35 matches, including 3 tournaments.
‘Our goal is to be the last team standing in the Big South Tournament. That will not be an easy task with the quality of teams in our conference, but we are here to win championships and we will work hard to prepare for that opportunity. Our strong non-conference schedule will help us prepare for our conference opponents and hopefully allow us to have a strong RPI by the end of the year,’ said the head coach of the team – Kelley Green.
The first home match of the season for Conway will be on 19th February against Appalachian State. Then The Chanticleers will play against Seton Hall. These two matches will be a part of the Kickin’ Chicken Classic. Conway’s schedule continues with a visit to Columbia on 21st Feb. At a later stage, for the first time in Coastal’s history, they will travel to Hawaii, in order to play three softball games with the host team. ‘This trip is really a once in a lifetime experience together,’ added Green.
The third tournament, Conway will participate in is called the Chanticleer Classic. The Conway’s opponents will be Memphis, Buffalo and Furman. The competition will start on 11th March and will last for 3 days.
The team will travel again for three consecutive conference series in April, taking on Winthrop, Radford and Campbell while hosting a double-header with Charleston Southern. Then the team will return home and play against Charleston Southern (26th April) with a single game and two series vs. Gardner-Webb and Longwood.
‘Our conference gets tougher every year and we always have a target on our backs, but our goals are to win the regular season and tournament championships. Anything less is a disappointment, as this is the Coastal way. With that said, we know we have a lot of work to do and need to be diligent in our preparation. We cannot get complacent. Our best players need to get 1% better each day and everyone else needs to get 3% better. If we can keep on focusing on the process throughout the winter months and continue this through the season, we should be right where we want to be in May,’ said Kelley Green.