Baseball Begins Tough Stretch of Games

4/6/2017 10:29:00 AM

By: LC Sports Information - Brad Welborn

The Louisiana College baseball team begins a tough stretch of games with six games against two top 25 teams. This week the Wildcats will host the University of Texas at Tyler and next week, travel to the University of Texas at Dallas. LC is currently in the seven spot in the American Southwest Conference standing with nine games remaining and the top eight teams earning a spot in the ASC tournament bracket. This weekend will also serve as the Wildcats premiere weekend for their off the field activities with "Autism Awareness Day" on Friday night and "Cats Crush Cancer" day on Saturday. More information on those events can be found HERE.

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UT Tyler | 26-4 (14-1)

The Patriots enter the weekend series with the Wildcats on an eight game winning streak including having won 13 straight ASC games. They defeated Millsaps College on Tuesday of this week 9-5 in Tyler. UTT sits in the top spot in the ASC standings with a 3.5 game lead on UT Dallas and East Texas Baptist. The Patriots have the conference's best rated pitching staff with a 3.06 team earned run average. They are one of two teams that have yet to allow 100 total runs this year and are one of two teams with over 200 strikeouts this season. They are holding their opponents to an average of 3.3 runs per game in 30 total games.

Ryan Cheatham leads the team in innings pitched at 50.2 with a 2.66 ERA and a 7-0 win-loss record in eight starts. He is second on the team in strikeouts with 33 and opponents are batting .201 against him this season. Cody Brown and Cason Adams, have the second and third most starts on the team with over 40 innings pitched each. Brown leads the team with 44 strikeouts and Adams ranks second with 38.

The Patriots lineup contains four players batting over .300 on the season with Daniel Williams and Trenton Buchhorn both over .400 on the season. They are averaging 6.6 runs per game. Williams leads the team with a .438 average, five home runs, and 36 runs batted in, and Buchhorn is batting .424 with three home runs and 28 RBI.

Louisiana College | 17-10 (8-7)

The Wildcats come into the series after a two games to one series win at Sul Ross State and won three of their last four games. LC is batting .315 as a team and averaging 7.5 runs per game. The Wildcats are 12-5 this season at Billy Allgood Field Seth Stevens leads the team with a .404 batting average, 24 runs scored, tied for the team lead with four home runs, and leads with 30 RBI. Kiefer Moore and Steven Pizano both have more than 20 RBI on the season and Moore leads the team with 10 doubles, and is tied with Stevens for the team lead in extra base hits with 13.

It was a tough time to be a pitcher in last Saturday's doubleheader with Sul Ross, with a combined 53 runs scored between the two teams in two games. Charlie Waddingham started the first game of the series and only allowed one earned run in 6.0 innings of work. He leads the Wildcats with with a 1.87 ERA this season and a 5-1 overall record. He has pitched two complete games this year with 53.0 total innings and is second on the team with 40 strikeouts. Austin Thompson has pitched 30.2 innings this season and leads the team with 45 strikeouts and opponents are batting .216 against him.

The three game series begins on Friday night at 6 p.m. with the Wildcats annual "Autism Awareness Day". Saturday is the "Cats Crush Cancer" day with a doubleheader starting at 12 p.m. all at Billy Allgood Field. The Wildcats will travel to UT Dallas next weekend for a matchup with the Comets before a non-conference doubleheader against Centenary on April 21 and the final three game series of the year against the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor, April 28-29. Stay connected to Louisiana College baseball all season at www.lcwildcats.net, following @LC_bsb on Twitter and liking LC Athletics on Facebook.

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