GAINESVILLE, Fla. (May 18, 2017) -- After the thrill of the announcement that FIU earned its third at-large selection into the NCAA Softball postseason, the Panthers have concluded their preparations and are ready to take the field against Oklahoma State and the rest of the NCAA Gainesville Regional, which begins Friday.
 
FIU faces the Cowgirls at noon, with the Gators facing Florida A&M at 2:30 from Katie Seashole Pressly Stadium. FIU's opening game will be televised nationally on ESPNU. The Florida-FAMU contest will air on SEC Network.
 
The four-team field, including the overall number-one seeded Gators and Florida A&M, will battle in a double-elimination format until one team is left to advance to the Super Regional Round next week.
 
FIU earned a berth by virtue of its 45-13 season, setting program records for wins and win percentage (.776) along the way. The Panthers finished second by record in Conference USA, a new program high, and advanced to their first C-USA title game, losing 1-0 to LA Tech. The loss was the first for FIU in its previous nine games and just the second in the last 16 contests to close out the season.
 
FIU led Conference USA in ERA (1.73), wins and fielding percentage (.977), finishing 18^th nationally in ERA and seventh in fielding. The Panthers had four players named to an all-conference team, with senior Stephanie Texeira (Miami, Florida / Gulliver Prep) and Jackie Schoff (Bradenton, Florida / Lakewood Ranch HS) earning All-South Region honors this week. Texeira is one of two players in Division I with 50 runs (51), 50 RBI (52) and 50 walks. She is third in the league in runs, but tops in C-USA in the other two categories. Schoff broke the school record with 52 runs scored and is two points away from the single-season mark for batting average (.444), which was set by Texeira two seasons ago. Schoff's 68 hits are fifth-most in the league, and .509 on-base percentage puts her fourth in C-USA. She is just one of 20 players in the country averaging more than one run per game played (1.08, 13^th in Division I).
 
The pitching is led by C-USA Freshman of the Year Shannon Saile (Land O'Lakes, Florida / Land O'Lakes HS), whose 3.35 hits allowed per game was third-best in the country and eight shutouts tied the school record, landing her in a tie for 17^thin the country. She was the only freshman in the nation to pitch eight shutouts for the year. She led C-USA with a 1.38 ERA and school-record opponent batting average of .145, while second in strikeouts, at 234. She needs six more punchouts to tie the school's single-season mark of 240. She led C-USA with 8.3 strikeouts per seven innings, the 28^th-best mark in Division I.
 
The Cowgirls were the Big 12 runners up, finishing the year with a 35-23 mark. They lost 6-0 in the title game to No. 6 Oklahoma. OSU is led by junior infielder Vanessa Shippy, who hits a team-best .396, with 14 doubles, four triples and 44 RBI, all team-leading totals. Her .425 batting average in Big 12 games only was tops in the conference. Senior pitcher Brandi Needham had the team-best 2.40 ERA. She matches Saile's 2017 pitching record of 19-9.
 
FIU and OSU were both undefeated against North Texas and Kansas in the regular season, but the Cowgirls defeated Hofstra 2-1 on February 17, while the Panthers lost 2-0 to the Pride on February 25.
 
This is the third all-time meeting between the programs, with the teams splitting a pair of games on neutral sites, in 2001 and 2004. FIU defeated OSU, 5-4, in March of 2004 in Boca Raton in the last meeting between the teams.
 
The winner faces the winner of Florida-Florida A&M Saturday at noon. The losers of the two Friday games play an elimination game Saturday at 2:30 p.m. The games will be televised on the ESPN family of networks, with the destination to be determined late Friday night after day one's action is completed across the 16 regional sites.
 
FIU is 2-4 all-time in the NCAA postseason, winners of two of the last three postseason games played. FIU's last postseason trip was to Gainesville, eventually falling to Florida in the Regional Final in 2010.
 
FIUSports.com spoke to FIU Head Coach Gator Rebhan at practice earlier this week for his thoughts on the team earning an NCAA Postseason berth and about their preparation for the regional. Click the play button in the graphic above to hear our conversation with him.
                                                                                                                 
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About FIU Athletics: FIU Athletics is home to more than 400 student-athletes in 18 different sports. Athletic events are played in eight different venues on FIU's campuses (Modesto A. Maidique and Biscayne Bay), including Lime Court at FIU Arena and Riccardo Silva Stadium.
 
About FIU: Florida International University is classified by Carnegie as a "R1: Doctoral Universities - Highest Research Activity" and recognized as a Carnegie Community Engaged university. It is a public research university with colleges and schools that offers bachelor's, master's and doctoral programs in fields such as business, engineering, computer science, international relations, architecture, law and medicine. As one of South Florida's anchor institutions, FIU contributes almost $9 billion each year to the local economy and is ranked second in Florida in Forbes Magazine's "America's Best Employers" list. FIU graduates are consistently among the highest paid college graduates in Florida and are among the leaders of public and private organizations throughout South Florida. FIU is Worlds Ahead in finding solutions to the most challenging problems of our time. FIU emphasizes research as a major component of its mission with multiple state-of-the-art research facilities including the Wall of Wind Research and Testing Facility, FIU's Medina Aquarius Program and the Advanced Materials Engineering Research Institute.  FIU has awarded more than 220,000 degrees and enrolls more than 54,000 students in two campuses and centers including FIU Downtown on Brickell, FIU@I-75, the Miami Beach Urban Studios, and Tianjin, China. FIU also supports artistic and cultural engagement through its three museums: Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum, the Wolfsonian-FIU, and the Jewish Museum of Florida-FIU. FIU is a member of Conference USA and more than 400 student-athletes participating in 18 sports. For more information about FIU, visit http://www.fiu.edu/.