The ISU softball team wont get an easy afternoon when it faces Missouri’s high-powered offense in its final home games of the season.

The Cyclones (26-21, 3-8 Big 12) host the Tigers (40-13, 7-5 Big 12) in a midweek doubleheader at the Southwest Athletic Complex on Wednesday, with the first game starting at 2 p.m.

Iowa State is on a two-game losing streak after being swept by the eighth-ranked Oklahoma Sooners over the weekend. In those two games, the Cyclones had trouble keeping the Sooners’ offense in check, giving up 14 runs over the two games, but the coaching staff remains confident.

“I think, defensively, we are really pretty good right now,” said co-head coach Gary Hines. “If we get consistent pitching, we can play with anybody – I think we proved that to ourselves [on Saturday.]”

It won’t be any easier to pitch against this Missouri team than anybody else in the Big 12. Missouri’s forte this year has been its offense, which leads the conference in hits, runs, home runs and steals. Hines, however, feels the difficult competition that the Cyclones have faced this year has more then prepared them for the challenge of pitching against such a line-up.

“I still think Oklahoma has got the best hitters in the league, so it won’t be something that we are overly concerned about,” Hines said. “We will have to pitch well.”

In order to have success as a staff, sophomore pitcher Charissa Carlin said Iowa State will have to make sure to keep the ball low in order to keep the Tigers from hitting home runs.

If Iowa State can do that, the team will have a good chance because the Cyclones are happy with how they’ve been playing as of late, despite getting swept this weekend. Sophomore second baseman Amanda Bradberry said Iowa State went into the series against Oklahoma with a lot of momentum and just ran into a really good Oklahoma team. She feels that the series was just a “speed bump” for the Cyclones, and they will be able to pick it up again this week.

Hines agrees.

“I think, based on the last four or five ballgames, we are playing better,” Hines said. “We are hitting the ball better overall – we had more people [on Sunday] contributing then we had going into the Drake series.

Missouri at Iowa State

When: 2 and 4 p.m.

Where: Southwest Athletic Complex

Admission: Free

Notes: These are the last home games for the Cyclones three seniors, Ariel Coburn, Amie Ford and Kristy Olsen. Iowa State has 29 home runs this season, surpassing the school record of 27.