Cats Corner: Checking in on spring sports

Avantika Singh, Assistant Video Editor

April 12, 2025

The Daily Northwestern · Cats Corner: Checking in on spring sports

In this episode, The Daily checks in on Northwestern’s spring sports and looks ahead to what’s next this season.

AVANTIKA SINGH: Although spring weather is nowhere to be found in Evanston, the ’Cats have hit the ground running with spring sports. Baseball, softball and lacrosse are in full swing here at Northwestern.

From The Daily Northwestern, I’m Avantika Singh. This is Cats’ Corner, a podcast on all things sports and purple pride. This week, we’ll be talking to Daily beat reporters about spring sports thus far and expectations for the rest of the season.

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Let’s start with women’s lacrosse. Last year, the team was the national runner-up, but two of its star players, Izzy Scane and Erin Coykendall, have since graduated. The team’s current record is 11-2 overall and 5-0 in conference play.

I spoke to Daily lacrosse reporter Jonah McClure about his thoughts on the program’s future.

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Welcome to Cat’s Corner, Jonah.

JONAH MCCLURE: Thanks for having me.

AVANTIKA SINGH: So, going into the season, what were your expectations for the lacrosse program, and how has reality compared?

JONAH MCCLURE: Going into the season, I expected this program to be very good as they have been for a number of years, despite losing Izzy Scane and Erin Coykendall going into the season. I still think that there was enough talent on this roster to make a deep run into the national championship as they did last year, and so far, they have lived up to that hype. Despite losing to both the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the country, they’ve beaten everyone else on their schedule, and I don’t see another loss coming.

AVANTIKA SINGH: Great, so speaking of your expectations for the rest of the season, how do you see this team performing?

JONAH MCCLURE: I feel like I don’t see a loss in the rest of the regular season. I’m not sure exactly how well they’ll fare in the Big Ten tournament, but as it looks, they’re undefeated in conference play right now, and I don’t see a loss coming there. It’ll come down to how this team fares against top teams like UNC and Boston College, as those have been their two losses. So if they can manage to bounce back and beat those teams in the national championship in the tournament, I think it’s possible that they can win it all, but it’ll depend on if they can take a step that they didn’t take earlier this year.

AVANTIKA SINGH: Thank you. And then, looking forward to the remainder of the season, are there any players or storylines that you think fans should be looking out for?

JONAH MCCLURE: Well, of course, the focus will be on Madison Taylor, whose 89 points lead the team, almost more than double than the next highest total of a player on this team. She is probably one of the best; she’s probably the best player in the country by many metrics.

Also, Delaney Sweitzer, transfer goalkeeper from Syracuse, has been lights out ever since she’s stepped into the role as starting keeper. So, I think those two will be the biggest stars to look for.

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AVANTIKA SINGH: Next, let’s look at baseball. Last year, the team had a 18-34 record overall with a 4-20 record in conference play. Currently, their overall record sits at 15-15 and their conference record at 6-6.

I spoke to Daily baseball reporter Anna Watson about how she sees the team’s trajectory.

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So, to start off, compared to this time last year, the baseball team has a better overall record. Going into April last year, they were 10-15, and this year going into April, they were 12-13. So in your view, what is behind this improvement in performance?

ANNA WATSON: I think it boils down to they’ve been able to find some power in Trent Liolios. So, NU being able to find some power and bats like that, and they’ve also come up in clutch moments, like just this Sunday, walk off fashion, beating one of the best teams of the Big Ten, Iowa, so that helps.

And they’ve also been able to find some consistency on the pitching staff, like Sam Hliboki, who’s transferred in from Vanderbilt. He’s provided a few good innings on the weekends for NU. They’re able to teach some of that up so they don’t have to go to the bullpen as much.

Also, same thing with Crawford Wade, and we haven’t seen Garrett Shearer since February at this point, but I hope that when he comes back, he will be in the same form he was at the beginning of the year because he was really lights out.

AVANTIKA SINGH: And do you think this sort of performance is sustainable looking ahead to the rest of the season? What are your expectations for the team?

ANNA WATSON: I think, I think I’m pretty optimistic because they play, they play some of the teams in the bottom half of the Big Ten at this point. Like we’ll have a series against, against, uh, Purdue and a series against Ohio State, and NU is frankly better than those teams, and we will have to play some of the top teams, most of those, most of the series they have are against teams that are, that are, that they can handle.

So, I expect them to come away with a few wins there, and they’ll definitely set some sort of new precedent for what the program can become this season. And again, if the bats stay hot, if the pitching stays consistent, and hopefully they’ll get Garrett Shearer back, that will provide a big boost for them.

AVANTIKA SINGH: Great, and then, as the season goes on, what should fans be looking forward to, any players, any key storylines you think they should be looking out for?

ANNA WATSON: Trent Liolios just crushing that home run record will be fun.

I’d look out for Matthew Kouser, the freshman on the mound, who’s been really good. He has a lot of potential, and I think the more he gets out on the mound, he’ll just become better, and watch out for Garrett Shearer to come back, because that’s someone I’m keeping an eye on and he has a lot of potential to be one of the best pitchers in the Big Ten.

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AVANTIKA SINGH: Moving on to softball, the ’Cats made an appearance in the NCAA Tournament last year but were eliminated in the regionals round. Their current record is 20-12-1 overall and 9-1-0 in conference play.

I spoke to Daily softball reporter Audrey Pachuta about what to expect from them this season.

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AVANTIKA SINGH: So let’s start by looking at softball seasons so far. How has the team been performing?

AUDREY PACHUTA: It’s a great question. If you would have asked me a month ago, I would have had a much different answer. So they are fully into their conference schedule, the swing of things right now. They’re 9-1, which a lot of people would have thought was very interesting coming out of their non-conference slate where they were a little less successful. They had two losing weekends in a row, they went to to the Purple and Gold Challenge in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and then the next weekend they were out on the west coast and it was just a couple of losing weekends in a row where they were losing to non-ranked teams, which isn’t something that’s very common for them.

But recently, they’ve been super successful, won a series against Minnesota, won a series this past weekend against Illinois, even though they dropped one game. They hosted Mississippi State a couple weeks ago, which was a ranked team, they were ranked 19th and they (NU) won one of those games. I’d say they’re in a pretty good place. They’re at the top of the Big 10 standing because, I probably should have, should have led with that, and they’re getting ready for a series against Nebraska this weekend.

AVANTIKA SINGH: Thank you so much and with the way that this team has been performing, do you see them making another appearance at the NCAA tournament?

AUDREY PACHUTA: It’s tough. I don’t like to be predictive. I would definitely say yes, kind of gun to my head, I guess I think that this weekend against Nebraska is going to be such a measure stick weekend. A lot of people are talking about different turning points in the season. I think this is one that you can point to and be like, this is a measuring stick. because as I’ve said in the early part of the season, every time they faced a ranked team, they dropped a lot of those games. In the nine games they’ve had against a ranked team, a team in the top 25, they’ve dropped seven of those games and only won two of them.

So they’ve got a ranked Nebraska team coming in this weekend, who is below them in the Big Ten rankings, but also I don’t want to, I don’t want to judge a book by, by that just because they faced UCLA, which is one of the best teams in college softball, and that sort of thing. So yes, they’ve had some losses. They dropped a game to Iowa last weekend, but this is not a team that, that you want to underestimate.

They have Jordy Bahl, who’s a pitcher who has come back after missing last season with a season-ending ACL injury, but she’s back. She’s a two-way player, lethal, offensive threat, lethal on the mound. She’s thrown 115 innings for them and has the second best ERA in the Big 10, as of the beginning of this week. So that’s definitely something to watch for. This is the team that has some of the most home runs in the Big Ten, and we’re a team who gives up the least amount of home runs in the Big Ten. So I think that’s definitely going to be something to look out for.

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AVANTIKA SINGH: From The Daily Northwestern, I’m Avantika Singh. Thanks for listening to another episode of Cats’ Corner. This episode was reported and produced by Avantika Singh.

The Sports editor of The Daily Northwestern is Charlie Spungin. The Audio Editor is Isabella Jacob. The Multimedia Managing editors are Anavi Prakash, Misha Manjuran Oberoi and Danny O’Grady. The Editor in Chief is Lily Ogburn.

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