Corinne Ozanne steps into the batters’ box right foot first, and settles into her wide, powerful stance. She grips her orange and white bat and raises it back behind her right ear, awaiting the pitch.

Chances are, if she hits the ball, she’s going to leave the box with a flipped bat and a home run.

Ozanne has homered in one out of every four at-bats this season for Syracuse (4-6) and leads the Orange with seven homers on the season. Her power anchors the SU lineup from the three spot, and her 11 RBIs, 1.103 slugging percentage and eight walks lead the team. Ozanne, a junior, is already fifth on SU’s all-time home run list.

The infielder will look to continue her power-hitting ways this weekend when Syracuse travels to Cathedral City, California for five games in the Mary Nutter Classic.

“When I see her up in the box, I can’t see a weakness,” SU head coach Leigh Ross said, “and that’s scary for defenses and for pitchers. She looks so confident and calm, you just don’t know where to go.”

When she’s at the plate, Ozanne always employs a wide stance and holds her hands high.

In the past, she said she struggled to keep her stance consistent but worked on it in the fall. Now, she doesn’t take a stride, which aids in her timing.

“Balance, torque from your back leg,” Ozanne said of her stance’s benefits. “That’s more strength, more generation of power that you have.”

She holds her hands close to her right ear, saying it’s where she feels more comfortable.

When assistant coach Matt Nandin joined the team last year, he worked with Ozanne on loading up with her hands as the pitch is thrown, so she can more easily recognize pitches and stay on plane. Before, she tried to load up too quickly, he said.

“She’s very consistent and gets the ball on the fat part of the bat very consistently,” Nandin said. “And with her strength, when she does that, she has a good chance to hit a home run.”

Ozanne’s increased ability to tell balls from strikes is valuable for a hitter feared by pitchers. Opponents often pitch around her, as evidenced by her team-leading walk total. When they do give her a pitch to hit, it’s rarely a good one.

To offset that, Ozanne tries to control the flow of her at-bats. She won’t step into the box until she sees the pitcher is ready to throw, she said.

“It’s a good confidence booster for myself that I know that people are or possibly could be afraid to pitch to me,” Ozanne said. “I like competition.”

This season, there isn’t a pitch over the plate she doesn’t like.

Ozanne said she used to struggle hitting inside pitches, but worked at it during the fall and even hit two home runs off inside pitches last weekend.

Her home run attire stays consistent, just like her stance. She walks to the plate wearing batting gloves, an elbow guard and a thumb guard while carrying a 34-inch, 25-ounce Easton bat covered in pine tar.

“Sticky,” Ozanne said of how she likes her bat. “To a point where I can hold it in my hand so like I’m Spiderman or something because it doesn’t come off my hand.”

When she clocks a dinger, she said she tends to take a simple jog around the bases. But when she wants to, she’ll “pimp a home run” with a bat flip and a hop out of the batters’ box.

Ironically, the power hitter wishes she hit fewer homers. She wants to lower her slugging percentage, which she views as unreliable, by hitting more singles and doubles.

For now, she’s just fine with being on pace for 38 round trippers.

“It will feel real good when I break some records,” she said. “It’s cool to know that I have the ability to do that but I’m not going to dwell on it.

Published on February 19, 2015 at 12:06 am