HAMMOND – Fresh off a two-game sweep of the No. 21-ranked Mississippi State Bulldogs, Southeastern Louisiana travels to Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Friday for the opener of a three-game Southland Conference series.
First pitch is slated for 6 p.m. at Chapman Field on the Islanders campus. The final two games are scheduled for Saturday (2 p.m.) and Sunday (1 p.m.).
This will be the fourth trip to Corpus Christi, Texas, for Southeastern, but only the second for a regular-season Southland Conference series. The Islanders hosted the Southland Conference Tournament at Whataburger Field, the ballpark for the Double-A Corpus Christi Hooks, in 2009 and 2010.
In the Lions only previous trip to Chapman Field (April 23-25, 2010), A&M-Corpus Christi took the first two games of a Southland Conference series before the Lions won the series finale, 11-3. Southeastern leads the all-time series, 7-5.
Last weekend, Southeastern dropped the first two games of its conference-opening series to Nicholls State before taking the series finale.
Brock Hebert (.439),
Jonathan Pace (.375) and
Ladd Rhodes (.362) lead Southeastern in hitting. The Lions are hitting .277 as a team.
A&M-Corpus Christi did not play midweek and took two-of-three from Texas-San Antonio the opening weekend of Southland play.
Eric Weiss (.316), Bobby Buckner (.300) and Kyle Danford (.263) lead the Islanders in hitting. A&M-Corpus Christi is hitting .226 as a team.
Friday the Lions will send senior right-hander
Joseph Koon (2-0, 4.35) to the mound to face left-hander Adam Hoelscher (4-1, 3.12).
Junior left-hander
Jordan Hymel (2-1, 2.65) will counter right-hander Tim Keller (0-2, 3.27) Saturday afternoon and senior right-hander
Josh Janway (2-0, 1.23) will oppose right-hander Daniel Minor (3-1, 1.29) Sunday in the series finale.
Minor was named a Louisville Slugger National Player of the Week for his four-hit shutout of UTSA the past Sunday in which he fanned 14 batters.
All three games can be heard in the Hammond area on KSLU-FM (90.9) and live statistics, courtesy the Islanders, are available at www.LionSports.net.
