Live Stats | Game Notes

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. - The University of Dayton softball team will be kicking off its 2014 season Friday at the UC Santa Barbara Gaucho Classic with two games at UCSB's Softball Diamond. The Flyers will face off against the host Gauchos Friday morning at 10 a.m. PT (1 p.m. ET) and will follow that with a noon (3 p.m. ET) matchup against 11th-ranked Texas A&M.

Dayton tallied a school-record 12 wins in league action in 2013 and made the program's fifth appearance in the Atlantic 10 Conference Championship - coach LaPlaca's second appearance in the post-season tournament in the last three seasons. She guided her team to a 22-24 overall record - the program's best winning percentage (.478) since 2005 - and a 12-9 mark in league action. The Flyers finished the 2013 regular season in sixth place in conference standings.

The Flyers return three players who made the College Sports Madness 2014 Preseason All-Conference Team: pitcher Kayla English and infielders Tiffany Ricks and Kasi Vasquez. English led the team with nine wins last year and also delivered the most strikeouts on the club with 174. Vazquez was the only Flyer to hit over .300 last season with her .333 mark and also was the team's co-leader in home runs with eight. Ricks is coming off a season when she hit .288, second-best among returning players.

The Gauchos finished the 2013 season witha 31-24 record, which marks their second 30-plus win season in a row. The team finished fourth in the Big West standings behind Hawai'i (1), Long Beach State (2), and Cal State Fullerton (3). Five Gauchos were named to the all-conference team, as Jessica Soria and Shelby Wisdom made the second-team while Lauren Boser, Keilani Jennings, and Alex Pingree were honorable mentions. Jennings finished last season as UCSB's all-time home runs leader with 31.

Texas A&M enters the first week of the 2014 season as the No. 11 team in the country. Last season, the Aggies reached the NCAA Super Regionals after downing Baylor 8-0 in five innings to clinch their regional title. Their season ended at the hands of the eventual national champion Oklahoma in back-to-back eight run losses. The Aggies return All-American catcher Cali Lanphear who led the team last season in nearly every batting category including batting average (.362), RBI (58), and home runs (21).