Bracket (PDF)
Tournament Program (PDF)
INDIANAPOLIS – Firestone Stadium, host for the Mid-American Conference (MAC) postseason, will also be welcoming eight teams for the Great Midwest Athletic Conference Softball Championship tournament starting this Thursday.
The Great Midwest officially made the transition after spending the previous four years in Xenia, Ohio, at the Athletes in Action Complex.
The race for the regular-season championship was compelling as it went down to the final day of the conference schedule.
Ohio Dominican won that intriguing race and enters the 2019 playoffs as the top seed in the bracket. The Panthers roared to the top of the standings with a 21-5 Great Midwest mark and will accept their new hardware at Wednesday evening’s championship banquet.
The all-conference team, as voted upon by the league’s coaches, will be unveiled while graduating senior student-athletes from each team will also be recognized in front of their peers. The annual player, pitcher, freshman and coach of the year, will also be announced.
Four first-round games will be conducted on Thursday starting at 10 a.m. and noon ET at Firestone Stadium and on the campus of Walsh University in North Canton. All games will feature live stats and video feeds on the Great Midwest Digital Network.
Following the completion of the first four games, every team will be back at Firestone Stadium for consolation games at 2 and 4 p.m. ET. The winner’s bracket games will be in the evening at 6 and 8 p.m. ET.
Friday’s schedule picks back up at 11 a.m. with six teams still in contention for the conference trophy and the AQ into the NCAA Championship Midwest Regional.
The 14th game of the tournament, the championship series, will start Saturday at noon ET.
Additionally qualifying for this year’s conference tournament is No. 2 Trevecca Nazarene, No. 3 Tiffin, No. 4 Cedarville, No. 5 Kentucky Wesleyan, No. 6 Malone, No. 7 Findlay and No. 8 Hillsdale. Going into the tournament, ODU is ranked eighth and TNU is ninth in the NCAA Midwest Region rankings.
With one more team added to the mix, the road to postseason qualification has just not been an easy path. Tiffin’s loud announcement as a new member of the league came after being picked seventh in the preseason coaches poll.
Malone overcame the toughest odds as the No. 12 pick before the season even began, but the Pioneers also beat regular-season champion ODU in the final week of the regular season. Findlay made the playoff field as one of three teams tied with a 13-11 record, including defending conference champion Hillsdale.
For the first time in two years, the Yellow Jackets of Cedarville find themselves as not the No. 1 seed and still remain a threat in the top half of the bracket. CU has been the regular-season champions of the league in both 2017 and 2018.
Three different players from the conference also received NFCA/Louisville Slugger National Player of the Week honors in 2019 alone: Trevecca Nazarene’s Mary Collins, Ohio Dominican’s Kelly Mix and Malone’s Bailey Byers.
In the event of inclement weather throughout the tournament, updates will be posted throughout the tournament on Twitter with the handle @greatmidwestac.
Tournament admission for the three-day tournament is as follows: All-Tournament pass ($25 adults; $15 students w/ ID, children 5 & under free), Thursday/Friday ($12 adults, $10 students with ID, children 5 & under free), Saturday ($6 adults, $5 students with ID, children 5 & under free).
Parking is free to all fans at the Firestone Stadium facility. The address for Firestone Stadium is 1575 Firestone Pkway, Akron, OH 44301.