Augustana College Athletics

In the sport of softball, having a good leadoff hitter is an important part of team success and it would be hard to find somebody who did it as well as Kathy Radloff. She came out of Rock Island High School in 1978 and enrolled at Augustana where her father Ralph was a professor in the religion department, and sister Ann was a standout tennis player. She made an immediate impact on the softball team, setting a school record that still stands in her freshman year when she batted .529 with 36 hits in 68 at-bats.

The success, both her own and the team’s, never stopped while the speedy left-handed swinger was in the lineup. During her career she helped the Vikings compile an overall record of 73-41 and place in the top 10 of the Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) national tournament three years in a row. After going 13-7 during her freshman year of 1979, Augustana was 27-9 in 1980 and finished third in the nation. An 18-11 campaign resulted in an eighth place finish in 1981 and the 1982 team was 15-14 and finished fifth in the country.

Radloff never stopped getting on base as she finished her career with a .450 (171-380) batting average that, to this day, is still a school record. At one time she held the career school record for at-bats (380), runs (130), hits (171) and stolen bases (48). She still remains on Augustana’s top 10 list in each of those categories and she is third in base-on-balls with 49. She has the top three single season batting averages (.529 in 1979, .505 in 1981 and .485 in 1980) in Viking history and her 63 hits in 1980 is still a school record.

Kathy graduated from Augustana in 1982 with degrees in math and computer science and went on to get her Master of Science in math from Western Illinois and her Ph.D in math from the University of Iowa.

She resides in Galena, Ohio with her husband Chaminda and daughters Malini and Natalie. She is currently an associate professor of math at Ohio Wesleyan University, a position she has held for the past 13 years.