Weekend Preview: Rice, FAU Meet With CUSA In Balance

For the second consecutive year, Florida Atlantic and Rice will meet on the penultimate weekend of the regular season for a series with significant ramifications for the Conference USA standings.

TOP 25 SERIES

(12) Vanderbilt at (1) Florida

(2) Texas A&M at (8) South Carolina

(3) Mississippi State at Auburn

Pittsburgh at (4) Miami

Kentucky at (6) Mississippi

(7) Florida State at Duke

(13) North Carolina State at (9) Louisville

(10) Texas Christian at Baylor

(11) Louisiana State at Tennessee

(17) Florida Atlantic at (14) Rice

Georgia Tech at (15) Virginia

Oklahoma vs. (16) Oklahoma State at Oklahoma City/Tulsa

Memphis at (18) Tulane

Louisiana Tech at (19) Southern Mississippi

Washington State at (20) Washington

Arizona State at (21) Arizona

(22) Cal State Fullerton at (24) UC Santa Barbara

(23) Clemson at Georgia Southern

(25) Creighton at Xavier

A year ago, Rice traveled to FAU with both teams tied for second place in CUSA. Rice swept the series and went on to win the regular season title—extending its streak of winning either a conference regular season championship or conference tournament to 20 years. This season, Rice and Southern Mississippi are tied for first place in the conference at 18-6, with FAU one game back going into this weekend’s series in Houston.

FAU coach John McCormack said as so often happens in baseball, the game has given them another chance—they just had to wait a year for the opportunity. But he doesn’t want his team to use last year’s series as motivation this weekend.

“I want them to be motivated to win the conference, I don’t want them to be motivated to beat Rice,” McCormack said. “If Rice happens to be the opponent, that’s great. But I don’t want to make this about Rice, it’s about us. It’s about us playing well, executing and doing well against a very good opponent.”

Rice (31-15) is also leaving last year’s results behind.

“I’m sure they reflect on that on their own, but it’s a new team and a new season for both teams,” pitching coach Patrick Hallmark said. “We’re certainly looking at it like that. They’ve had a good team the last few years. They come out throwing strikes and play good baseball. It’s a whole new season and we’ve got to go win again.”

It likely will be a low-scoring series, with No. 14 Rice and No. 17 FAU coming into the weekend ranked Nos. 1 and 2 in CUSA in ERA at 2.57 and 2.90. The two pitching staffs do it in slightly different ways, however.

Rice again has a strong starting rotation, with junior righthander Jon Duplantier (6-4, 2.20) pitching on Fridays, followed by senior lefthander Blake Fox (4-6, 2.48) and sophomore righthander Ricardo Salinas (7-1, 3.06).

FAU (33-14) has a solid rotation, but its bullpen carries a heavy load. Seven Owls have made more than 10 relief appearances, and all have an ERA of less than 3.75.

The strength of FAU’s bullpen is not by accident. McCormack said he believes watching a reliever lose the lead late in the game is demoralizing for a team and when he became a head coach eight years ago he wanted to avoid those scenarios.

“One thing I really wanted to make sure of is that we have a good bullpen,” he said. “We recruit to that bullpen.”

That philosophy is working. With relievers such as junior righthander Colyn O’Connell (2-0, 1.59) and freshman lefthander Nick Swan (3-0, 2.59) providing a bridge to junior closer Cameron Ragsdale (0.86, 13 SV), FAU is tough to beat when it has a late lead.

Rice is also tough in late-game situations, thanks to sophomore closer Glenn Otto (6-1, 1.60). The righthander is more of a bullpen ace, capable of working multiple innings when necessary and has thrown 50 2/3 innings in 25 appearances this season.

“Glenn just likes to pitch,” Hallmark said. “We like to get him the ball with a lead. It’s nice to have him back there. He’s certainly the competitor you want.”

Both offenses do have dangerous hitters, as well. Rice is led by junior outfielder Charlie Warren (.343/.421/.389) and freshman shortstop Ford Proctor (.342/.431/.441). FAU shortstop C.J. Chatham (.366/.432/.574, 6 HR) has been one of the best hitters in the conference this spring, and the junior is climbing draft boards as a result.

With so much talent on the field and so much at stake this weekend, the series will be pressure packed for both teams. But neither Hallmark nor McCormack are concerned about how their team will respond.

“These guys will be ready to play,” McCormack said. “For the most part, it’s an older group and they enjoy these type of games.”

“The guys are all excited,” Hallmark said. “They’re done with school and they’re just itching to play baseball. Most of our guys have been here before. This is the time of year we love playing baseball.”

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Louisville, North Carolina State Meet For ACC Showdown

Louisville head coach Dan McDonnell can finally stop answering questions about when his team will win a road series. It took until their fifth crack at it, but the ninth-ranked Cardinals finally won a series away from home at North Carolina last weekend, moving into a virtual tie for first place in the Atlantic Coast Conference’s Atlantic Division in the process.

“It’s just college baseball this year,” McDonnell said, “especially in the ACC. There’s a lot of parity. . . . Going on the road and winning, it’s difficult for a lot of people.”

Just ask anyone who’s had to go to Louisville. The Cardinals are a whopping 29-1 at home this spring, their lone loss coming March 25 against Virginia. Their final home series will be their toughest though. No. 13 North Carolina State comes in this weekend having proven itself on the road in series wins at Georgia Tech and Virginia, and the two teams are in the thick of the race for top-eight national seeds in the NCAA tournament.

“I think it’s just our guys,” Wolfpack assistant Chris Hart said of the team’s road success. “I think we have a good combination of older guys, leaders—Chance Shepard and Andrew Knizner and Preston Palmeiro—guys that’ve been there and done it. And then the young guys are good players and they’re not afraid to go play baseball. It’s just a game, and I don’t think playing on the road bothers our guys. They know it’s the same game, just a different place.”

The Cardinals have the edge in the national seed race for the moment, with their No. 2 RPI according to WarrenNolan.com, but the Wolfpack isn’t far back at No. 6 and is only a game behind in the loss column in the ACC standings, so a series win would put NCSU on the inside track heading into the last week of the regular season.

Their series this weekend will see two of the ACC’s most complete teams going head-to-head. Both roll out lineups with seven of their nine regulars hitting over .300, and they collectively rank first (Louisville) and third (NCSU) in the ACC in team average. The dynamic junior Corey Ray (.325/.395/.593, 13 HR, 35 SB) grabs the headlines from atop the Cardinals’ lineup, but they’ve also benefitted immensely from the return of junior second baseman Nick Solak (.414/.507/.577, 9 SB) and his toughness and leadership in the middle of the lineup. Solak missed a month with a hand injury, then promptly went on a six-game hitting streak after returning April 27.

“We’ve got a lot of weapons, and we can do a little bit of everything,” McDonnell said. “We don’t try to live and die off of just stealing bases, or just hitting home runs or whatever. We just try to grind it out and manufacture runs. That’s easier to do with an older lineup, and what we call a professional group. These guys have played a lot of baseball, and you can see their maturity.”

Hart echoes those sentiments when speaking about the Wolfpack’s lineup, which has solidified with the insertion of hot-hitting freshman outfielder Brett Kinneman (.321/.427/.536) and the return of speedy sophomore outfielder Josh McLain (.339/.396/.521) from a hand injury of his own. The Wolfpack’s lineup doesn’t have a star the caliber of Ray, but like Louisville’s it offers a little of everything. Chance Shepard (11 HR) and Preston Palmeiro (6 HR) have dangerous power, and the lineup is chock full of tough hitters such as breakout star Evan Mendoza (.380/.444/.460), who enters the weekend on a 20-game hitting streak, along with outfielder Brock Deatherage (.329/.415/.491, 12 SB) and top-of-order tone setter Stephen Pitarra (.313/.385/.375).

That Wolfpack offense will have to contend with one of the nation’s deepest pitching staffs—Louisville leads the ACC and ranks ninth nationally in ERA at 2.83—but there will be some terrific matchups on the mound. Saturday’s game features a pair of lefties with outstanding command and secondary stuff in the Wolfpack’s Brian Brown (7-1, 2.48) and Louisville’s Drew Harrington (9-1, 1.73), and the finale will pit two of the conference’s premier Sunday starters in Ryan Williamson (7-1, 2.63) and Kyle Funkhouser (6-3, 4.54), the former first-rounder who McDonnell believes has settled into the role after being displaced from Fridays by Brendan McKay. McKay’s numbers (9-2, 2.22) might not be as other worldly as in his Freshman of the Year season last year, but he’s allowed just one run in his last two starts—in addition to hitting .333 in the middle of the order—and the Wolfpack will need the best out of enigmatic junior Cory Wilder (3-2, 5.05) to keep it in the game on Friday.

“They’re a pretty darn talented team,” Hart said. “A combination of power and speed, not to mention their arms on the mound are pretty special as well. They’re probably the most talented and balanced team that we’re going to play, and they’re pretty special at home. We’ve definitely got our work cut out for us, but we’re up for the challenge. We’re ready to go … Just go play Wolfpack baseball and we’ll be all right.”

— Jim Shonerd

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Fullerton Finding A Way

Before this season, Cal State Fullerton head coach Rick Vanderhook laid out a clear vision for his veteran team—a vision very much in line with the style of play the Titans and many west coast teams have long been known for.

“You talk about expectations,” Vanderhook said, “here’s your expectations—field .980.

“Let’s set the bar pretty high at what we field. And if we field .980, then the pitchers will pitch well . . . and we’ll figure out how to score runs.”

Consider those expectations met. With three weeks left to go in the regular season, the Titans have indeed fielded .980—actually, .981, good for seventh in the country—and their pitchers have indeed pitched well, so well that they lead the nation with a 2.33 ERA.

And now in the last month or so of the season, as Vanderhook promised, the Titans have figured out how to score runs. While by no means an offensive juggernaut (hitting .261/.343/.373 as a team), No. 22 Cal State Fullerton has scored just enough to win four straight weekend series and surge into first place in the Big West standings (30-16, 12-3 Big West).

“I think the offense has come around pretty well over the last month,” Vanderhook said. “We’re scoring enough runs. We still have that shutout thing that comes around every couple of weeks.

“Hopefully we get a week off of that this week.”

This week, of course, the stakes are a little higher. The Titans head to No. 24 UC Santa Barbara to face a Gauchos team that trails by just three games in the conference standings. UCSB is a little banged up on the injury front—both Saturday and Sunday starters are listed as TBA behind ace righthander Shane Bieber—and the Gauchos have lost three of their past four games to below .500 teams. But Vanderhook is by no means taking them lightly.

“I’m not looking at what they’ve done lately, for sure,” Vanderhook said. “They’ve played exceptionally well at home this year (21-2) . . . They’ve got Bieber on Friday night, who’s really solid. They can pitch, and they can execute very well, and they’re a very good team. They’ve played everybody and anybody and they’re battle-tested, and I hope we’re up to the challenge.”

While perhaps no one can truly replace former Fullerton ace Thomas Eshelman—arguably the program’s most highly regarded pitcher—the Titans have found a suitable alternative on Fridays in the form of sophomore righthander Connor Seabold (6-3, 2.08), who boasts a 79-to-7 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 65 innings. Behind him, the Titans have an experienced lefthander in John Gavin (4-2, 2.45), last year’s Sunday starter. And freshman righthander Colton Eastman (7-2, 2.09) rounds out the formidable trio, which is supported by an equally deep bullpen, led by hard-throwing closer Chad Hockin.

Offensively, after leaning heavily on drafted junior David Olmedo-Barrera last season, the Titans have received more well-rounded contributions from veterans like seniors Tanner Pinkston (.320/.404/.440) and Dalton Blaser (.372/.462/.519). Always known as a smooth defender, a physically stronger junior shortstop Timmy Richards leads the team with seven home runs, batting .281/.358/.485. He’s also stabilized an infield that has had to lean on youth at third base and second base at times this season.

“He’s come a long way offensively,” Vanderhook said of Richards. “Timmy could always catch it, and now he’s more physical. Our biggest thing with him is, ‘Dude, are you ever going to hit a single?’ If he hits some singles, he’d probably be hitting .330, but it’s more extra-base hits.”

Richards and the rest of the Titans won’t have an easy slate the rest of the way, starting with the Gauchos this weekend. They’ll also travel to current second-place Big West team Long Beach State to finish the regular season. Ranked No. 40 in the RPI according to WarrenNolan.com, the Titans seem in solid shape for the NCAA tournament, and could play their way into the hosting conversation with a strong finish.

“We’ve got 10 games left,” Vanderhook said. “And we’re just going to play Friday and see what happens, and do the same thing Saturday and same thing Sunday. That’s all we can do, and then we’ll let everyone else figure out the numbers of everything.”

— Michael Lananna