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PINEVILLE, La. – At the beginning of the season, the Louisiana College softball team was picked to finish fourth in the American Southwest Conference East Division and miss the American Southwest Conference. Some of the Lady Cats even report having heard people outside the doors of the LC locker room suggesting that even fourth place was too generous.

Not enough pitching and too many players lost in the offseason to transfer after a coaching change was the normal claim of the Lady Cats' detractors.

Yet, after a hard-fought conference campaign, the Lady Cats (25-11) enter this year's American Southwest Conference Championship Tournament as the No. 2 seed from the East; this after having missed out as the No. 4-ranked team in the East a year ago.

“We're all excited to be back,” sophomore center fielder Chelsea Allen (Houma, La./Vandebilt Catholic) said. “We wanted to get this program back on top and this was one step we could take to do that. It was something we wanted to achieve as a team and for the school. And we were playing for our seniors. We didn't want our two seniors, Devan Greene and Cassie DeCoste, to miss out on the tournament their last two years.”

Louisiana College kicks off play in the double-elimination ASC tournament Thursday at 2:30 p.m. at Oran Good Park in Farmers Branch, Texas, with a game against Howard Payne (19-19), the No. 3 seed from the ASC West Division.

This will be the first meeting between LC and Howard Payne this season.

Should LC win this game, they would play again Thursday night at 7:30 against ASC West Champion Mary Hardin-Baylor (24-14), a team LC has played thrice already. A loss to Howard Payne would send LC to the loser's bracket where they would play either Texas-Tyler, East Texas Baptist or Hardin-Simmons at 11 a.m. Friday.

That the Lady Cats are alive at all might not have been predicted but first-year coach Mark Rosier said he did not dwell on the lack of faith when motivating the team.

“It wasn't something we made an issue of as a coaching staff,” Rosier said. “We never talked about it being an  us against the world situation. All we asked of them, as coaches, was to give us everything they had. I told them, time and again, 'Play so that when you come off the field, you can hold your head up high knowing that you honestly did everything in your power to help us win. Don't worry about what anybody else thinks or says just play so that you can be at peace with yourself at the end of the game.'

“To me, that's the best approach to the game. Just focus on yourself and what you can control and what you can do for each other as teammates. Because once that first pitch is thrown, that's all you really have, your own skills and your teammates. The crowd can cheer and be supportive, but the one consistent is the team behind you.”

While Rosier attempted to ignore naysayers from a coaching standpoint, both he and Allen admitted that the words of doubters had reached their ears.

“We knew people doubted us from the beginning,” Allen said. “We heard we would be lucky to finish fourth and might come in last in the East. But we realized all we could do was ignore it. We just kept a positive attitude about it. And we will head into the conference tournament with a positive mindset.”