SFA To Face Islanders In Regular Season Finale
5/15/2013 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
May 15, 2013
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Games 53-55 Jaycees Field |
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| 3:00 p.m. - Thurs., May 16 6:30 p.m. - Fri., May 17 1:00 p.m. - Sat., May 18 (Click Game/Time for Gametracker) |
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Probable Starting Pitchers Thursday Friday Saturday |
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Game Notes & What To Watch For:
- The final weekend of the regular season is upon the Lumberjacks, as is an outside chance at a share of the Southland Conference title. SFA will finish out the regular season at home this weekend against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, a team a game ahead of the ‘Jacks and one gunning for a conference championship of its own.
- SFA would need a weekend sweep of Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, in addition to a sweep by Central Arkansas at league-leading Sam Houston to clinch a share of the crown. The Islanders could claim at least a share of the league crown with a sweep of SFA and at least one loss by the ‘Kats at home against UCA.
- SFA will honor its 11-member senior class before Saturday’s series finale.
- SFA is 14-11 all-time against the Islanders, most recently winning two of three games at Corpus Christi a year ago. The ‘Jacks have taken eight of the last 11 meetings since 2010. This will be TAMUCC’s first trip to Nacogdoches since the 2010 season when SFA took the first two games of the series in 4-3 fashion before falling 6-3 in the finale.
- SFA’s Hunter Dozier saw his 16-game hit streak come to and end on with an 0-for-3 outing in the series finale vs Oral Roberts; however, he has maintained another streak and enters Friday having reached base in 42 straight games.
- Since taking over a late-inning role early in the year, reliever Brett Higginbotham has been nearly unhittable. In his last 20 appearances, the sidewinding senior righty has the following numbers: 4-1 record, 9 saves, 0.51 ERA, 35.0 IP, 13 hits allowed, .121 opponent’s batting average, 2 runs allowed, 32 strikeouts and 10 walks.
- Hunter Dozier is cementing his name in the SFA record books this season, having already set the all-time doubles record and rapidly moving up in a number of other categories. The junior infielder is now just one of three Lumberjacks in school history with 200 career hits, and needs just five more to break Zach Gardner’s career hits record at the school, in one less season. He also recently broke his own school single-season doubles record set last season, and needs six more two-baggers to tie UTSA’s Michael Rockett for the Southland Conference doubles record, both in a single-season and career.
- Not only is Dozier atop the league standings in multiple statistical categories, but also outfielder Ricardo Sanchez ranks fourth in the Southland with his .377 batting average. Should the two remain where they are in the league rankings, it would be the first time SFA has had a pair of hitters finish in the top five in the league in batting average.
- Senior right-hander Justin Choate has been key for the Lumberjacks in the past six weeks, rounding out the weekend rotation as a solid Sunday starter for SFA. Since a March 19 start at Rice, Choate is 3-0 in seven appearances (6 starts), tossing 42.0 innings with a 2.57 ERA, 31 strikeouts to just 10 walks while holding hitters to a .252 average in that span.
- SFA clinched a berth in its fifth straight Southland Conference Tournament over the weekend. The ‘Jacks can be no higher than the No. 2 seed and no lower than the No. 7 seed in the tournament, pending this weekend’s results.
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