LAFAYETTE (PRESS RELEASE) – A pair of tournaments at Lamson Park, trips to tournaments at Baylor and Oklahoma, and an increase in midweek contests highlight the 2019 Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns Softball schedule announced by head coach Gerry Glasco.
“Our schedule provides us with double-digit games against high-quality non-conference opponents including two Pac-12 teams (Cal, Oregon State), two of the premier Big 12 programs (Baylor, Oklahoma) along with a Top 50 RPI club in McNeese that will give us great competition and spark regional interest,” Glasco stated. “Additionally, we are thrilled to get Nicholls and Louisiana Tech back on the schedule which will create interest in the state’s softball community as well as our fans.
“Our fans are the most important part of our program,” Glasco stressed. “We made an effort to provide a schedule that tests our team, prepares us for postseason and offers great entertainment for the best fans in all of college softball.”
New for the 2019 season is the switch to a three-day, single game format for Sun Belt Conference weekend series. SBC games at Lamson Park will primarily follow a 6 p.m. (Friday), 2 p.m. (Saturday), 1 p.m. (Sunday) time schedule.
The renewal process for season tickets is currently underway and current season ticket holders are encouraged to renew online at RaginCajuns.com using Account Manager. The deadline for season ticket renewal is Monday, Oct. 29.
Louisiana opens the season hosting tournaments at Lamson Park the first two weekends: the Ragin’ Cajuns Classic (Feb. 7-11), featuring Pac-12 foe California, and the 33rd Annual Louisiana Classics (Feb. 15-17).
The Ragin’ Cajuns are on the road final two non-conference weekends traveling to Waco, Texas, Feb. 22-24 for tournament action at Baylor and to Norman, Okla., March 1-3 for a weekend event at Oklahoma.
Sun Belt Conference play begins March 8-10 at Texas State, then Louisiana returns to Lamson Park on March 11 to face Baylor in the first of eight midweek games on the schedule.
“This team is very deep and extremely talented,” Glasco said. “We want to jump right out of the gate in the early stages of the season and play strong teams in order to expose the weaknesses that we will need to address in order to prepare us for a deep postseason run in May and June.”
The following week the Ragin’ Cajuns host Troy in the Sun Belt home opening series March 15-17 and end the mid-March homestand on March 20 against I-10 neighbor McNeese. Louisiana closes out March with road Sun Belt series at South Alabama (March 22-24) and Georgia Southern (March 29-31).
Three of the four weekends in April will be spent at Lamson Park with SBC series against UT Arlington (April 5-7), Georgia State (April 18-20) and Coastal Carolina (April 26-28).
The regular season concludes May 2-4 in Monroe at ULM, and then the Ragin’ Cajuns return to San Marcos, Texas for the 2019 Sun Belt Conference Tournament set for May 8-11 at Bobcat Softball Stadium on the campus of Texas State University.
The NCAA Tournament begins the following weekend with 64 teams playing across 16 regional sites. Louisiana has an active streak of 20 straight NCAA Tournament appearances and is one of only nine programs to appear in the field every year since 2000.
The 2019 season marks the second season for Louisiana under the guidance of Gerry Glasco. In 2018, Louisiana reached 40 wins for the 20th straight season and was ranked in both major national Top 25 polls the entire season, finishing No. 18/19 in the final edition of the rankings.
