BOTETOURT, Va. --- Friday morning Biola will have its first-ever opportunity to play for a national championship. The Eagles got off to a 4-0 start at the National Christian College Athletic Association World Series to book their spot in the championship game against No. 1 seed Erskine College (Ill.).

The championship game, which is scheduled for 9 a.m. PT on Friday will feature the only two NCAA Division II schools in the original eight-team tournament field. Both schools enter the title game with unblemished tournament records.

Biola was the winner of Pool B and took down Concordia Ann Arbor 6-1 in the semifinals. The Eagles have outscored opponents 24-5 so far in the tournament. Erskine went 3-0 to win Pool A and then took down Judson 4-0 in the semifinals. The Flying Fleet has outscored its opponents 19-8 so far at the tournament.

Biola and Erskine have never met in the sport of softball. This matchup means that for the second time this season Biola and Erskine will occupy the top two spots in a NCCAA Championship event. Biola Women's Golf won the national title with Erskine as the runner-up earlier this fall.

The Flying Fleet came into the tournament as the no. 1 seed after narrowly missing out on the NCAA Division II regional postseason. Erskine went 33-12 in the regular season and was 16-4 in Conference Carolinas play to win their regular season conference title.

However, the Fleet could not get any offense going in their conference tournament and lost two-straight games to be eliminated and miss out on the conference's automatic qualifier for NCAA Division II postseason. So, they opted for NCCAA postseason instead, and it's been very favorable for them with a perfect 6-0 mark so far, including regionals.

The two teams had zero shared opponents throughout the season, but they played the same two teams today. Biola defeated Judson 6-4 in its opening game; Erskine beat those Eagles 4-0 in the semis. Erskine beat Concordia Ann Arbor 7-4 in its opening game; Biola beat those Eagles 6-1 in the semis. That's a virtual wash as Biola got two wins by outscoring those opponents 12-5 and Erskine got two wins, outscoring them 11-4.

The Flying Fleet are led by Hannah Houge, who was the Conference Carolinas Pitcher of the Year in 2019. She was 16-5 with a 1.10 ERA in the regular season and has since transformed that into a 19-6 mark with a miniscule 0.96 ERA. So far at the World Series she's thrown 18 innings and allowed just four total hits and zero runs. She's struck out 16 in those 18 frames.

It seems likely that the championship will end up being an A+ matchup between Houge and Biola's Paige Austin. Austin has been just as good at this tournament, appearing in all four games for Biola and going 3-0 with just one run allowed over 18 innings of work. She's got 33 strikeouts in those 18 frames.

Through its first 44 games of the season Biola's offense has averaged 5.0 runs-per-game. They've obviously added to that through the first four games of this tournament, scoring six runs in each of their first four games. A large chunk of that has come in the early innings, with 18 runs scored in the fourth inning or sooner.

Erskine's got 53 games under its belt to this point and is seeking its first-ever 40-win season. Biola's job will be keeping that from happening with a win on Friday. The Fleet come into the meeting averaging 4.1 runs-per-game this year. Biola has just three fewer total runs despite playing in nine fewer ballgames.

Center fielder Reagan Davis has been the most potent bat in the lineup for Erskine so far this week. She's batted third in the lineup for all four contests and is 7-for-13 with six RBI and two runs scored. She drove in four runs in the Flying Fleet's tournament-opening 5-4 extra-innings win over No. 8 seed Kentucky Christian.

Davis is a .331 hitter this season. She's second on the team with 17 extra-base hits and also second on the team with her 35 RBI. This Erskine team has some big boppers as it features four different players with five or more homeruns, including RBI-leader Shi Cain, who also leads the team with 10 big flies.

The good news for Biola is that despite being a pitcher that elicits a lot of fly balls, Paige Austin has only allowed one homerun all season long. That's in over 135 innings pitched.

Biola will also need to keep an eye on the two speedsters on this Erskine roster, Allison Neeley and Kelci Brown. Both steal bases at a high success rate and high frequency. Neeley was 24-for-27 this season and Brown 14-for-17. Neeley has three stolen bags already this tournament and Brown has two. Those bases can become very, very important in a tight championship game.

Biola's been happy to run itself, stealing a combined 12 bases in the three pool play games. The Eagles swiped a season-high five bags in both the Cincinnati Christian contest and the Judson game. Both Tori Apodaca and Ruth Munoz have a multi-steal game already this tournament.

It should be a compelling ballgame on Friday. First pitch is scheduled for 9 a.m. PT. The game will be live streamed ($) at https://thenccaa.org/tournaments/?id=486&path=network. Complimentary live stats will be published at https://thenccaa.org/sidearmstats/softball/summary.