Belhaven softball and Madi Miller headed back to NCAA Division III Super Regional
Published 9:00 am Wednesday, May 22, 2024
- PHOTO BY BELHAVEN SPORTS INFO Brookhaven High and Co-Lin alum Madi Miller has had another standout season playing for the Belhaven Blazers. Belhaven will play in Georgia this week in the NCAA Division III Super Regionals.
For a third consecutive year, the Belhaven Blazers are headed to the Super Regional round of the NCAA Division III softball tournament.
Brookhaven High alum Madi Miller helped get Belhaven on the board in the championship game of their regional at Washington University in St. Louis over the weekend.
The Blazers closed out the regional with a 2-1 victory and trailed 1-0 after the first inning.
Miller, who is in her second year playing at Belhaven after having a decorated career at Copiah-Lincoln CC, beat out a throw to first base in the third inning. That RBI single tied the game at 1-1 and the Blazers then later took the lead in the top of the sixth.
Belhaven is now 40-6 and will begin a Super Regional matchup at no. 6 Berry College on Thursday. Game one in Rome, Georgia is scheduled to begin at 1 p.m. on Thursday and then game two will be played on Friday at 12 p.m. If a third and deciding game is needed, it will be played following game two.
The Blazers finished as runners-up in the Collegiate Conference of the South (CCS) tournament to Maryville College (Tennessee). Maryville beat Belhaven 6-3 in 13 innings to start the tournament in Montgomery, Alabama earlier this month.
Miller and her squad bounced back to win three tournament games before losing in the championship, 6-5, to Maryville again.
In the regional round, Belhaven beat Grinnell College (Iowa) 4-2 and Greenville University (Illinois) 7-2 before the championship clinching victory over Washington.
Miller, the leadoff batter and center fielder, got the Grinnell victory started with a triple and then scored on an error. She also had an RBI in the win over Greenville.
Currently sporting a .345 batting average, Miller has driven in 24 runs and hit four doubles, seven triples and one home run for coach Kevin Griffin.
Belhaven went 32-13 last season and lost in the Super Regional round at Berry when they were swept after dropping a 2-0 loss in the opener and a 1-0 defeat in nine innings in game two. Berry went on to go 2-2 at the NCAA Division III World Series, losing to eventual runners-up Salisbury (Maryland).
Maryville beat Berry 2-1 in the first round of their regional matchup last week, but Berry bounced back to beat Huntingdon College 4-3, Transylvania University 5-0 and then get back to back wins over Maryville (7-6, 11-0) to win the region.
Miller was recently recognized as an NFCA All-Region VI Third Team selection, the second consecutive season for her to earn that honor. She was also picked All-CCS First Team as well.