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Louisiana Roadtrip Concludes at SLU
March 06, 2017 07:13 PM | Baseball
HAMMOND, La. – The West Virginia University baseball team concludes a week-long stay in Louisiana at Southeastern Louisiana on March 8. First pitch on Wednesday is at 7 p.m. ET/6 p.m. CT, at Pat Kenelly Diamond at Alumni Field.
UPDATE: Due to inclement weather in the Hammond, Louisiana, area, Tuesday's game has been cancelled. Wednesday’s game is still scheduled, and a single game will be played at 7 p.m. ET/6 p.m. CT, at Pat Kenelly Diamond at Alumni Field.
West Virginia is facing Southeastern Louisiana for the first time in program history.
The Mountaineers (7-4) went 2-2 in their first four games in Louisiana. West Virginia opened the weekend with an 8-1 victory at Nicholls on Thursday, March 2. WVU followed with back-to-back losses at Tulane on Friday, 9-8, and Saturday, 6-0, before an 18-5 win in Sunday’s series finale.
The Lions (7-4) have won three in a row at the Cox Diamond Invitational after dropping three of their previous four games. Last weekend, SLU beat South Alabama at home before traveling to Pensacola, Florida, for neutral-site wins over Seton Hall and Troy.
FOLLOWING ALONG
Southeastern Louisiana will have a live stream (subscription required) and live stats for Wednesday's game, and those links can be found on the baseball schedule page on WVUsports.com.
Additional behind-the-scenes updates, news and notes from Louisiana can be found on social media by following and connecting with the team at @WVUBaseball on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
SCOUTING SOUTHEASTERN LOUISIANA
Winners of three in a row, Southeastern Louisiana enters the week with a 7-4 record. The Lions are 3-1 at home, 2-3 on the road and 2-0 at a neutral site. SLU owns a 2-3 mark against ranked opponents.
The Lions swept the Cox Diamond Invitational, with a 4-3 win over South Alabama on Friday night before traveling to Pensacola, Florida, to beat Seton Hall, 13-1, on Saturday, and Troy, 5-4, on Sunday. Prior to the weekend sweep, Southeastern had lost three of its last four, including two at No. 10 Vanderbilt.
Drew Avens leads the team with 15 hits, a .395 average, 13 runs scored and 10 walks. Taylor Schwaner has a team-best 13 RBIs and is second with a .316 average and a .500 slugging percentage. On the mound, Evan Hileman has pitched 6.0 scoreless innings in relief and has allowed four hits. Carlisle Koestler has pitched in three games with one start, logging a 1.46 ERA in 12.1 innings. Starter Mac Sceroler leads the team with 26 strikeouts in 18.0 innings pitched with an ERA of 3.00.
The Lions are coached by Matt Riser, in his fourth season at the helm. He guided Southeastern to back-to-back 40-win seasons and the NCAA Tournament in 2016 and owns a 127-67 record with the team.
SERIES HISTORY VS. THE LIONS
West Virginia has never faced Southeastern Louisiana. The Mountaineers are a perfect 6-0 against current teams in the Southland Conference, following an 8-1 win on Thursday night at Nicholls.
WVU is also 4-0 against New Orleans after a four-game sweep in 2013 in Morgantown. In 2015, WVU traveled to Stephen F. Austin and won, 14-5 in a mid-week contest.
UP NEXT: ROADTRIP CONCLUDES AT OLD DOMINION
The Mountaineers conclude their 12-game roadtrip, and a season-opening 16-game stretch away from home, with a series at Old Dominion from March 10-12. The opener is set for 6 p.m. ET, in Norfolk, Virginia, while Saturday’s game begins at 3 p.m. The first pitch of Sunday’s finale will be at 1 p.m. at ODU’s Bud Metheny Baseball Complex.
LAST TIME OUT: SPLIT IN LOUISIANA
WVU began its 12-day, nine-game roadtrip with an 8-1 victory at Nicholls on March 2. In the first game of a series at Tulane the following day, West Virginia rallied from down 7-0 but ultimately lost, 9-8. On March 2, the Mountaineers were shut out for the first time with a 6-0 loss. WVU won the series finale at Tulane, 18-5 on March 3, scoring 18 runs on 20 hits.
WVU won its sixth consecutive game with Thursday night’s 8-1 victory at Nicholls in Thibodaux. The West Virginia pitching staff held the opposition to just one run for the third consecutive game and the offense was fueled by another well-rounded attack throughout the order. Four pitchers, led by starter Isaiah Kearns (2-0) combined to hold the Colonels to one run on three hits. In his first career start, Kearns held Nicholls hitless into the fifth inning and allowing just one hit and walked one with a career-best five strikeouts in 5.2 innings. Offensively, Jackson Cramer was one of five Mountaineers with two hits, and he added two RBIs on a two-run home run. Brandon White also had two RBIs with one hit.
In the series opener at Tulane, West Virginia rallied to erase a 7-0 deficit and tie the game at 8-8 in the ninth inning, but Tulane won it in the bottom of the ninth, 9-8. The Mountaineers fell behind 7-0 in the fifth inning but rallied with a five-run sixth and runs in the seventh, eighth and ninth innings to tie the game at 8-8. Kyle Davis led WVU with a career-high four hits, three RBIs and a run scored.
On Saturday, West Virginia was shut out for the first time this season in a 6-0 loss at Tulane. Starter J.P. France held WVU to four hits while walking two and striking out four. He retired WVU in order three times and held West Virginia to one baserunner in the third and fourth innings. Two Mountaineers reached in the sixth and seventh, but a double play ended the sixth and France retired the next three in the seventh to get out of each inning unscathed.
In Sunday’s series finale at Tulane, WVU exploded for 18 runs on 20 hits in an 18-5 victory. The win marked the second time in the season’s first 11 games that WVU scored 18 or more runs and had 20 or more hits. WVU scored multiple runs in five of the first six innings. Eight of West Virginia’s nine starters had at least one hit, and six had at least one RBI in the victory. Five Mountaineers had multiple hits and multiple RBIs.
The offensive outburst was led by Kyle Davis, who had three hits and a career-high five RBIs. Jimmy Galusky was 3-3 with three hits, a career-best three RBIs, three runs scored and a pair of walks and Cole Austin added a career-high-tying three hits and two RBIs, including an inside-the-park home run, his third homer of the season. Austin also scored a game-high four runs. Marques Inman had a career-best four hits with two RBIs and three runs scored and Ivan Gonzalez was 2-3 with a pair of hits, a career-high three RBIs and two runs scored.
QUICK HITS: KEY TEAM NOTES
- West Virginia is celebrating its 125th year of baseball. Founded in 1892, WVU owns an all-time record of 2,102-1,506-19.
- Darius Hill has a career-best and team-leading 13-game hitting streak, dating back to last season. He has at least one hit in each of WVU’s first 11 games and has four multi-hit games and four multi-RBI contests. Hill is second on the team with 17 hits and third with 11 RBIs.
- WVU’s 6-2 start to the year followed a 5-1 start in 2016, the first time since 2006-07 the Mountaineers have started back-to-back seasons with at least five wins in their first seven games. Just like a six-game winning streak in 2017, WVU’s start to 2016 included a five-game winning streak.
- West Virginia went 2-0 against No. 18 Coastal Carolina on Feb. 25 and 27, its first games against a ranked foe in 2017 and its first-ever games against a defending national champion.
- In West Virginia 22-9 win at No. 18 Coastal Carolina on Feb. 25, WVU’s 22 runs were the most since it scored 23 against Duquesne in 2010. WVU’s 29 hits was three shy of the school record of 32, set in 2009, and the Mountaineers’ six home runs was one shy of the school record of seven, set in 1997. WVU’s 56 at-bats is a new school record. Jackson Cramer had a career-best five hits, four extra-base hits and three doubles, all one shy of tying the school record, and he added a career-high six RBIs.
- Every starter in the lineup has had at least one hit twice in WVU’s first seven games, while every starter has recorded an RBI once.
- Coach Randy Mazey is 131-105 at West Virginia and became the fifth coach in program history to eclipse the 100-win mark and the second to accomplish the feat in his first four seasons.
- West Virginia was voted to finish fifth in the 2017 Big 12 Conference baseball preseason coaches’ poll, WVU’s highest preseason ranking since joining the conference in 2013.
- WVU won 36 games in 2016, the most wins in a single season in coach Randy Mazey’s four years and the most since 2009 (37).
- WVU went 3-1 at the 2016 Big 12 Championship and advanced to its first Big 12 Championship game and first conference title game since 1996.
- Darius Hill and Ivan Gonzalez were named to Freshman All-America teams after leading WVU in several offensive categories as freshmen in 2016
- WVU has had 14 draft selection in coach Randy Mazey’s four seasons, the most draft picks in a four-year stretch in team history.
- Attendance has increased in each of WVU’s first four seasons in the Big 12 Conference, highlighted by a program-record total of 40,390 fans in 2016, for an average of 1,346 fans per game. WVU averaged a record 1,507 n the inaugural season at Monongalia County Ballpark in 2015.
Season tickets, single game tickets, flex plan tickets and mini packs for the 2017 WVU baseball season are on sale now. Fans can purchase tickets by calling 1-800-WVU GAME, going to WVUGAME.com or visiting the Mountaineer Ticket Office in the WVU Coliseum. The 2017 schedule is available on WVUsports.com.
For more information on the Mountaineers, follow WVU Baseball on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and visit WVUsports.com.
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