JACKSONVILLE, Ala. – Eastern Kentucky University’s softball team will begin its quest on Thursday for the program’s third Ohio Valley Conference championship this decade. The third seeded Colonels (28-20, 17-10 OVC) will face sixth seeded Samford (23-27, 14-13 OVC) at 11 a.m. ET. The double elimination tournament is being held in Jacksonville, Ala., and hosted by top seeded Jacksonville State University.

All of the Colonels’ games at the 2008 OVC tournament will air live on WEKY 1340 AM in Richmond. The games can be heard worldwide by visiting www.EKUsports.com. Each broadcast will begin 10 minutes before the first pitch.

The winner of the EKU/Samford game will advance to face second seeded Morehead State at 4 p.m. ET on Thursday. The loser of the first round game will fall into the elimination bracket and play on Friday at 1:30 p.m. ET.

Eastern Kentucky is one of only four teams that played a complete conference schedule this season. The Colonels swept Southeast Missouri, Tennessee-Martin and Austin Peay. EKU won series against Tennessee State, Samford and Eastern Illinois. The Colonels lost series against Morehead State and Tennessee Tech. OVC regular season champion Jacksonville State is the only team EKU did not beat at least once. The Gamecocks swept the season series, but won two games by only one run.

The Colonels and Bulldogs faced each other in a three-game series in Richmond at the end of March. Samford won the first game 11-5. Eastern won the second game of the doubleheader 7-4 and then returned to the field the next day to win the series finale 2-1.

Eastern Kentucky is 30-26 all-time in the OVC tournament. The Colonels have never failed to qualify for the six-team event and they have only gone winless once, in 2005, the last time the tournament was in Jacksonville. EKU claimed the regular season and tournament championships in 2002 and 2004.

The tournament is scheduled to begin on Thursday and conclude with the championship game on Saturday.