SIOUX FALLS – For the second time this season, the South Dakota State University softball team has swept the weekly Summit League softball awards. Monday, Jackrabbit second baseman Lindsey Culver was named Summit League Player of the Week, while Tori Kniesche was selected as the Summit League Pitcher of the Week.
A returning freshman from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Culver put up huge offensive numbers in a four-game sweep at Western Illinois April 2-3. She batted .692 (9-for-13) with five home runs, seven runs batted in and eight runs scored.
She also tallied a 2.231 slugging percentage as eight of her nine hits went for extra bases (five home runs, two triples, one double). She hit two home runs in both games of the April 2 doubleheader and recorded a pair of three-hit games in the series.
Kniesche, a freshman right-hander from Wayne, Nebraska, pitched a pair of complete-game shutouts in improving to 11-1 on the season. She fired a two-hitter with 12 strikeouts in her April 2 start, then tossed a one-hitter with a dozen more K’s the next day. Kniesche also was honored as Summit League Pitcher of the Week after the opening weekend of the season on Feb. 15.
SDSU earlier swept the Summit League awards March 8, when Rozelyn Carrillo earned Player of the Week honors and Grace Glanzer received Pitcher of the Week recognition.
The Jackrabbits, 23-4 overall and atop the Summit League standings at 8-0, take a 10-game winning streak to Creighton on Wednesday for a 3 p.m. matinee. SDSU is scheduled to open the home season Saturday with a noon doubleheader against Summit League foe Omaha.
