Another special first for a player who's already one of the Hillsdale College softball team's all-time greats.
Chargers junior pitcher Joni Russell became the first Hillsdale College softball player in program history to earn the Wilson/NFCA DII Pitcher of the Week award on Tuesday afternoon, sharing the honor with Indianapolis' Kenzee Smith.
Russell won the award for a dominant weekend in the circle that included becoming Hillsdale College's all-time strikeouts leader on Sunday, surpassing the record of 474 strikeouts set by Sarah DeAngelo in 2001 with 10 in a 5-0 win over Quincy. It was the second shutout of the weekend for Russell, who now has 478 Ks in her career.
Russell rolled against Quincy, striking out 10 of the 24 batters she faced, issuing just two walks and conceding just one hit in a record-breaking performance. Arguably it was only Russell's second-most impressive performance of the weekend, as Russell also shut out a NCAA Tournament qualifying team from 2023 in Illinois-Springfield in a 10-0 victory on Saturday, striking out 13 of the 27 batters she faced and giving up two hits and three walks in a complete game performance against one of the best offensive teams in the Midwest Region last year. Along with the strikeout record, Russell also moved into third place all-time in career shutouts with 14, and also into the top 10 in innings pitched in her career with 364. Her 36 career wins now rank sixth all-time at Hillsdale.
While Quincy and Illinois-Springfield had no answers for Russell, they aren't alone in the junior ace's three year career, or in the season so far. Russell has 50 strikeouts to 12 walks in 33.2 innings pitched to date, and her ERA of 0.83 is only slightly worse than the 0.76 that ranked in the top five nationally in 2023 and helped her become Hillsdale's first-ever consensus All-American pitcher, as well as the G-MAC Pitcher of the Year.
Russell and the Chargers next head to Florida for their annual spring break trip, with 10 games in six days, before returning to Hillsdale to begin conference play on the 22nd.