LANCASTER, Pa. – The Ursinus College softball team was ranked seventh in the Centennial Conference preseason poll released Wednesday by the league office. The Bears earned 18 points in a sampling of the conference's head coaches, who were not permitted to vote for their own teams.

Gettysburg, which fell to McDaniel in last year's CC championship, was a unanimous first choice. The Bullets collected eight first-place votes and a total of 64 points to top the poll, and 2014 champion Haverford landed in second with 46 points. The defending regular-season and tournament champion Green Terror were tied with Washington College – which received the other first-place vote – in third with 44 points. Those clubs were followed by Franklin & Marshall (41), Muhlenberg (35), Ursinus (18), Dickinson (16), and Swarthmore (9).

The Bears bring back their entire pitching rotation, along with the lion's share of their lineup, from a squad that finished the 2015 campaign 13-20 overall and 1-13 in conference play. Junior Casey Derella, a Second Team all-conference outfielder a year ago, leads the returning student-athletes; she hit .289 with five doubles, three triples, a home run, and 11 RBI a season ago. Senior Zoe Heinke finished with 20 RBI to place second on the team, while sophomore infielder Rachel Hyman batted .353 and drove in ten runs.

Sophomore Kaitlyn Willis will headline the rotation after a sensational rookie campaign in which she went 6-5 with a 2.31 ERA, good for seventh in the conference. She struck out 57 (11^th CC) and walked 16 over 69.2 innings, and also smacked one of the team's three home runs. Heinke picked up five victories in 16 starts a year ago, compiling a 4.72 ERA over 99.1 frames of work, and sophomore Bridget Winay made six starts over 12 appearances as a first-year player.

Ursinus will also hope for significant contributions from its nine-member freshman class, which will comprise more than half of the roster in 2016.

2016 Centennial Conference Preseason Poll