SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. – Cal State East Bay softball returns to California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) action this weekend with a road trip to Cal State San Bernardino starting on Friday, April 3. The top eight teams in the current league standings entering Friday are within 6.5 games of each other with 16 league contests remaining.

This weekend's CCAA schedule will begin to sort out the contenders from the pretenders including both the Coyotes and Pioneers. Last season Cal State East Bay earned a series sweep of Cal State San Bernardino, its first of a CCAA opponent since joining the league. It sparked the Pioneers playoff push which ultimately fell one game shy on the final day of the regular season.

During that series Cal State East Bay used the long ball to provide a majority of its scoring. As a team the Pioneers hit just .217, but nine of the 20 hits cleared the Pioneer Field, led by three from Kelsey LaVaute.

Cassandra Williams is CSUSB's top pitcher and comes into the weekend with an 11-9 record and 121 strikeouts in 125 innings. In two starts against the Pioneers last season she allowed 12 runs (five earned) and gave up six home runs in 8.2 innings.

The Cal State San Bernardino offense is led by senior All-American Nicole Nobbe. She leads all CCAA players with her .510/.615/.843 slash line and 16 doubles. Nobbe also leads the Coyotes with six homers, 24 runs batted in, and 23 walks. In last year's series against the Pioneers she hit .385 (5-for-13) with one double and one RBI.

Outside of Nobbe the rest of the Coyote hitters are batting a combined .243 (192-for-791) this season. Victoria Lievanos and Cassandra Williams are both hitting over .333 through 34 games in 2015.

Ali Cerminara has done anything but experience a "sophomore slump" in her second season with the Pioneers. She leads East Bay with a .381 batting average, eight doubles, 29 RBI, and .436 on base percentage. Defensively she has thrown out 11-of-34 would-be base stealers (.324) and committed only two errors as the primary catcher this year.

Gabby Gonzalez continues a steady climb seeing her batting average rise from .273 to .341 over the past month. She enters the CSUSB series with the team's longest active streak having reached base safely in 14 straight games.

Jaynie MacDonald has already surpassed her home run (10) and RBI (28) totals from last season in 16 fewer games. She has 16 career homers and is joined on the East Bay all-time career list by teammates LaVaute (17) and Cerminara (15).

Sierra Clark has thrown five straight quality starts and has posted a 0.95 ERA over her past six outings. The Pioneer ace has struck out 58 batters in 110 innings and allowed only 23 extra base hits during that stretch.

Cal State San Bernardino won its previous two CCAA series' 3-1 over Chico State and at San Francisco State. The Coyotes enter this matchup coming off a pair of lopsided losses to Cal Baptist by 10-4 and 11-3 scores on Tuesday, March 31.