Elle Pottorf has faced the base-stealingest softball team in the nation in Texas A&M. Kansas University’s freshman catcher also has gone against the runningest runner-ups in Baylor.

Now, Pottorf will face the team that ranks No. 3 nationally in thefts when the Jayhawks meet Georgia Tech in an NCAA Tournament first-round game today.

“Coach warned me they love to run the bases,” said Pottorf, a Washburn Rural product, “so I’ll be ready for anything.”

Game time is scheduled for 4 p.m. at the softball stadium on the Georgia University campus in Athens, Ga.

Pottorf had mixed success against the nation’s top two base-stealing teams. A&M ran at will against her with 14 thefts in two games, but Baylor managed only four steals in two outings.

“When we played A&M,” KU coach Tracy Bunge said, “Elle had a pretty bad hand. We didn’t even know if she would play in that series.”

Pottorf had not suited the previous two games — the only games she missed all season — after being hit by a pitch on her throwing hand. Kansas played the Bears two weeks after the series with the Aggies. The Jayhawks lost all four games.

Georgia Tech runners have stolen 154 bases and been caught only 25 times. Pottorf, meanwhile, has nailed 14 of 52 runners attempting to steal, including two A&M runners.

“Even though A&M ran against us with reckless abandon,” Bunge said, “the A&M coach said Elle threw out more of their runners than in any two-game series they had played.”

Serena Settlemier, a fourth-year junior, is the Jayhawks’ probable starter for today’s game, although Bunge never reveals her starting pitcher until hours before game time.

6Sports video: KU softball to face Georgia Tech in NCAA tourney

If Settlemier, who leads the Jayhawks with 13 victories, doesn’t start, the nod would go to freshman left-hander Christina Ross, who has posted a dozen wins.

The Jayhawks likely will face Georgia Tech’s Jessica Sallinger, the Atlantic Coast Conference pitcher of the year. Sallinger has a 27-7 record with a 1.07 earned run average.

Bunge says Sallinger reminds her of a right-handed Kami Keiter, the Oklahoma southpaw who went 1-1 against the Jayhawks during the season. Keiter blanked KU in the Big 12 Tournament, but KU touched her for 15 hits in eight innings during a series in Lawrence.

“Kami was a little sharper in the game in the tournament,” Bunge said, “but we had just come off a tough (1-0) loss to Texas, and we didn’t come out very aggressive against her.”

Curiously, although Georgia Tech (49-12) has 19 more victories than Kansas (30-22), the Jayhawks are the No. 2 seed in the Georgia regional while Tech is the third seed.