JUCO softball: Southeastern sweeps Indian Hills in battle for ICCAC lead

OTTUMWA — Expectations were that Indian Hills and Iowa Western would be battling it out for the Region XI softball title.

The Warriors and Reivers, however, are both looking up at the surprising leader in the Iowa Community College Athletic Conference standings midway through the season.

Southeastern's relentless attack staked the Blackhawks to early leads in both games of Wednesday's conference doubleheader at Indian Hills. The Blackhawks connected on 22 hits over the first 11 innings, jumping out to six-run leads in both games leading to a pair of wins over the Warriors as three home runs keyed Southeastern to an 8-2 win in game one before a late rally by IHCC fell short in a 6-3 loss in game two at Romalynn 'R.L.' Hellyer Field leaving Southeastern alone at the top of the ICCAC standings with a 7-1 record.

"You can't expect any game, let along two, if you're only going to compete in three of the 14 innings," Indian Hills head softball coach Gretta Hartz said. "I don't think that we presented ourselves that we were going to win the ballgames. I'm big on acting big. You've got to fake it until you make it. You've got to act like you're going to win the game before you actually do it. We never decided like we were going to act like we were going to win."

Indian Hills (18-20, 5-3 ICCAC) hosts Rock Valley in a four-game weekend series. The first two games will be played on Saturday starting at 2 p.m.