Softball Boasts Five on NFCA All-South Region Team
5/14/2015 12:00:00 AM | Softball
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. - For the second straight season, five Alabama players have been voted onto the NFCA All-South Region team, as Alexis Osorio, Haylie McCleney, Marisa Runyon, Demi Turner and Danae Hays represent the Crimson Tide on the postseason list.
Four of Alabama's five honorees were named First Team All-Region, giving the Crimson Tide at least four First Team All-Region honorees in four of the last five years. Alexis Osorio, Haylie McCleney, Marisa Runyon and Demi Turner represent the Tide on the First Team while senior shortstop Danae Hays earns her first career All-Region honor on the Third Team.
This season's All-Americans will be announced on Wednesday, May 27, just prior to the start of the Women's College World Series. Alabama has had at least one All-Region honoree take home All-American honors every year since 1999, including a current streak of 10 straight seasons (2005-14) with multiple All-Americans.
This season, Osorio was named the SEC Freshman of the Year, the first for Alabama since Kayla Braud in 2010, and was also named to the First Team All-SEC, SEC All-Freshman and SEC All-Tournament teams. The Riverside, Calif., native led the Alabama pitching staff with 17 wins this season, posting an SEC-leading 1.60 ERA in conference play. She was the only pitcher to surpass 100 strikeouts in conference play, 67 of which were swinging, while holding SEC opponents to a .186 batting average. She is one of 10 finalists for the NFCA Freshman of the Year Award.
McCleney is making her third appearance as a member of the First Team All-South Region, as she has also been named an All-American in each of the past two seasons. This year, she earned All-SEC accolades for the third straight season and was also named the SEC Scholar-Athlete of the Year. She leads the team and ranks third in the SEC with a .462 batting average while also drawing a league-leading 52 walks. Her .604 on-base percentage leads the SEC and is currently a season record at Alabama, surpassing Kayla Braud's previous record of .564. McCleney also holds Alabama career records in on-base percentage (.565) and batting average (.456).
Runyon earns her first career All-Region nod, as she was also named Second Team All-SEC earlier this year. An incredibly productive second half of the season gave her a team-leading 17 home runs and 70 RBI. Her RBI total marks just the fourth time in program history a player has drove in at least 70 runs in a season and is just nine shy of Charlotte Morgan's school record total. She has hit multiple home runs in four different games this season, becoming the only player in program history to do so. Her three home runs against Arkansas on May 2 tied a single-game school record while her seven RBI against Tennessee on April 25 was just the fifth time an Alabama player has hit at least seven RBI in a game, the first since 2008.
Turner, who was also named Second Team All-SEC, ranks among the top 10 in the SEC in batting average (.434) and hits (72) while leading the league with 11 sacrifice bunts. Her 25 multi-hit games leads the team this season, as she has earned a hit in 39 of her 52 starts. She was named SEC Freshman of the Week twice this season, a feat only accomplished by four other players in program history.
Hays has started all 54 games at shortstop this season for the Tide while hitting .280 with 44 hits, including 15 extra-base hits, and 33 RBI. Defensively, she is second on the team in assists with 68 with her sliding tag to catch Florida's Jessica Damico stealing in game three against the Gators earned her an appearance on ESPN SportCenter's Top 10 plays.
