The Utah women’s softball team has lost confidence in its bats.
The Utes have seen a drastic change in their batting since the beginning of the season and have lost nine of their last 10 games because of their lack of confidence at the plate.
“Our confidence has been checked,” said coach Amy Hogue. “They are walking into the box carrying their last at-bats and it’s really holding them back.”
In their past 10 games, the Utes have scored just 10 runs, in comparison to the 49 runs they scored in their first 10 games.
The Utes spent their two practice days this week working on getting their confidence back, as the team used almost all of its practice time working from the dish.
“That’s all we did8212;hit and hit and hit until they felt comfortable,” Hogue said. “Everything was on their time; don’t get out of the box until you feel comfortable.”
Although practice never fully simulates an in-game experience, Hogue hopes her Utes will carry some of the confidence they have built as they travel to Texas this weekend to take part in the Texas A&M tournament.
“We won’t know until we get in those games and see, but they are leaving here with some of that confidence back and I’m hoping they can carry that with them,” Hogue said.
The Utes will be looking to break out of their losing slump and get their first win against a ranked opponent this weekend, as they will face No. 17 Texas A&M twice. The Utes will also face Kent State and match up against Stephen F. Austin State in the three-day tournament.
For Utah to come out of the tournament successful, Hogue said her team is going to need to put an entire game together.
“We’ve had good enough hitting, we’ve had good enough defense, we’ve had good enough pitching8212;just not all together in an appearance with a ranked opponent,” Hogue said. “We just need to find a way to put it all together and I think we could absolutely beat (Texas A&M).”
In addition to getting the bats going, the Utes will also be focusing on having fun this weekend8212;something they haven’t been doing since their losing streak started three weeks ago.
“If you start losing a lot of games in a row you forget the fun in the game,” Hogue said. “You have to start having fun first and the winning will come8212;you can’t wait to start winning to have fun.”
The Utes will kick off the tournament with a matchup against Kent State on Friday afternoon.
