series scope, 2015

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SERIES SCOPE

FRIDAY, MAY 22, 2015A SPECIAL PUBLICATION OF THE

2 0 1 5 N A I A W O R L D s e R I e s p R e v I e W / L e W I s t O N t R I b u N e F R I D A Y, M A Y 2 2 , 2 0 1 52

8 Concordia (47-16)

9 St. Thomas (44-16)

4 LCSC (41-11)

5 Davenport (51-10)

6 Embry-Riddle (39-17)

3 Tabor (53-10)

7 Lindsey Wilson (41-17)

10 Vanguard (38-20)

1 Okla. Baptist (52-6)

2 Faulkner (48-13)

FRIDAY’S GAMES SATURDAY’S GAMES MONDAY’S GAMES TUESDAY’S GAMES WEDNESDAY’S GAMES THURSDAY’S GAMES FRIDAY’S GAME

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ChampionIf THREE teamsare remainingafter Games 16and 17 ...

If TWO teams are remaining after Games 16 and 17 ...

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Select World Series games will be shown live on ESPN3, SWX

The Avista NAIA World Series will once again have a few games shown live on regional television and nation-wide on the Web-based ESPN3.

Tonight’s Davenport/Lewis-Clark State game at 7 p.m. will be shown on SWX, a Spokane-based channel. SWX will also air next week’s Thursday evening game and the if-necessary championship game Friday.

ESPN3 will show games next week on Wednesday, Thursday and, if played, Friday.

“We like the package; we worked hard to keep it together,” LCSC athletic director Gary Picone said. “The NAIA would like to progress in the ESPN package, and there may be a time the ESPN package takes over, and that’s fine if it happens.

“As the college, having an identity on a Northwest television station (SWX), that’s nice to have and it re-ally gives us some exposure,” Picone added.

Video of all Series games will be streamed live, for a fee, via the tournament’s website at naiaworldseries.com.

F R I D A Y, M A Y 2 2 , 2 0 1 5 2 0 1 5 N A I A W O R L D s e R I e s p R e v I e W / L e W I s t O N t R I b u N e 3

2 0 1 5 N A I A W O R L D S E R I E S P R E V I E W / L E W I S T O N T R I B U N E F R I D A Y, M A Y 2 2 , 2 0 1 54

By CAITLIN BEESLEYOF THE TRIBUNE

For the second year in a row, Oklahoma Baptist enters the Series as its top seed. But this migratory return to Lew-iston also marks the Bison’s final appearance, as OBU en-ters NCAA Division II play next season.

It’s that inevitable fact, more than a shot at redemp-tion, that has the Bison all hot and bothered heading into the tournament.

“You’d love to go out on top,” Bison coach Bobby Cox said. “But to talk about it, it’s so difficult to get (here); it takes breaks and a lot of things to happen.

Cox knows, having coached OBU for nearly three decades and steered the Bison into five Series, the first back in 1989.

“Lewiston’s always been spe-cial to me,” he said.

Getting back this year wasn’t easy: Despite their 52-6 record, the Bison had to rally from eight runs down to beat LSU-Shreveport in the title game of the Shawnee Bracket on May 15. Trailing 11-3 in the bottom of the seventh inning, OBU put up a snowman to tie it and then tacked on an additional six runs in the eighth be-fore winning 17-12.

“It was a goal of mine and the team to try and close the (NAIA) history of going to Lewiston,” Cox said. “We’re just excited to be able to do that.”

At last year’s Series, the Bi-son won their first two contests before stumbling, losing to eventual champions Cumber-land and then being eliminated in a wrenching, 11-inning 4-3 loss to Oklahoma Wesleyan.

When asked if his squad had any unfinished business, Cox said, “There’s a core that came back from that group. I think every year is different ...

(but) the drive (was) to try to get us back to Lewiston. Once you get there, it’s like who knows?”

Last year’s pitch-ing ace, Julian Mer-ryweather depart-ed, but Kelvin Rivas capably took over, and this season has averaged almost 14 strikeouts a game, tops in NAIA. His record is 12-0, and he threw a complete-game shutout in his last outing, shutting down Sterling 5-0 in the Opening Round tournament.

“He spent a lot of time ... working on conditioning,” Cox said of Rivas, who’s upped his velocity from last season’s 88, to its current 95. “He’s just blossomed into your true No. 1.”

At the plate, the Bison boast the highest batting average in the NAIA, .369, thanks to the trio of Landon Coon, Yariel Gonzales and Joey Szczepan-ski, who are among the na-tion’s top 12. OBU uses a com-bination of clutch hitting and

smart baserunning to average 9.10 runs per game.

“It takes a lot of runs here (in Oklahoma),” Cox said. “You’ve gotta be able to score runs and score quite a few. Sometimes that doesn’t trans-late in Lewiston.”

Coon, the Sooner Athletic Conference player of the year,

hit .431. It will be the first trip to Lewiston for him and Gonza-les; both are junior transfers.

“They both had really out-standing seasons,” Cox said of the pair, who are 3-4 in the bat-ting order. “We lost a couple of really good players in the mid-dle of the lineup (and) they’ve driven in a lot of runs for us.”

Oklahoma BaptistLocation: Shawnee, Okla.

Nickname: Bison

Coach: Bobby Cox (29th year)

Season record: 52-6

Rank in fi nal NAIA poll: No. 2

How qualifi ed: Won Shawnee Bracket

Number of previous appear-ances; best fi nish: fi ve (four at Lewiston), fourth in 1989

> Juice (of fi ve)STARTERS:

Rivas is a strikeout machine, averaging 13.95 per game. Fel-low openers Parra and Hearn are back-pocket pitchers who’ve kept OBU in contention all season long. The trio have com-bined to go 31-1-1 this season.RELIEVERS: ½

Fimbrez, the closer, has taken the mound 25 times and notched seven saves. The go-to guy for a team that doesn’t typically need saves, Fimbrez has also notched seven wins.FIELDING:

Tied with Concordia in overall fi elding percentage, OBU aver-ages three double plays a game.HITTING:

Bison hitters like to fi nd the gaps, leading the NAIA in doubles and slugging percent-age. They rely on clutch hitting more than home runs or steals.SPEED: ½

Cox credits his team’s style of play to the gusty Midwest weather, which may require adjustments in the relatively windless Lewiston.INTANGIBLES:

The Bison have the incentive of leaving the NAIA on top. And if they catch their bats on fi re, they could make a run at the title.

O K L A H O M A B A P T I S T S TAT SBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVE. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SOYariel Gonzalez .433 203 64 88 25 1 9 64 18 12Landon Coon .431 216 69 93 16 8 13 70 17 43Joey Szczepanski .429 203 48 87 18 3 5 59 10 29Shakeel Newton .375 144 49 54 4 0 1 33 21 22Keach Ballard .368 209 68 77 22 0 8 56 36 17Ryan Joyce .348 89 48 31 8 2 6 20 17 16Felipe Gonzalez .341 167 40 57 12 0 2 41 30 15Colt Bickerstaff .325 120 28 39 8 0 8 38 21 20Tyler Melton .323 99 36 32 6 0 0 13 17 17Cody Ziegler .319 69 4 22 8 0 0 17 11 14Jeff Ricker .303 185 58 56 7 2 2 30 15 19Garrett Gallacher .284 116 8 33 9 2 2 34 11 16Totals .368 1838 528 677 144 18 57 481 224 243Opponents .227 1640 200 372 63 7 26 180 146 518

PITCHINGMinimum six appearances

ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOKelvin Rivas 1.88 12-0 91.0 55 23 19 32 141Jinny Parra 2.37 10-1 76.0 66 23 20 8 64Kyle Fimbrez 3.16 7-1 42.2 26 16 15 15 42Jeff Gunter 3.18 1-0 11.1 12 4 4 0 13Taylor Hearn 3.38 9-0 58.2 39 34 22 29 66Nathan Thompson 3.55 5-1 50.2 43 20 20 23 67Brad Adams 4.57 1-1 17.1 15 10 9 7 16Chris Gomez 4.84 4-1 35.1 47 20 19 8 37Les Northcutt 5.00 3-0 36.0 43 24 20 7 36Chad Bennett 5.75 0-1 20.1 17 17 13 14 22Tallen Parker 7.84 0-0 10.1 9 9 9 3 14Totals 3.40 52-6 449.2 372 200 170 146 518Opponents 9.53 6-52 414.2 673 528 439 225 243

Saves (9) — Chad Bennett, Kyle Fimbrez 7, Jinny Parra.

Tribune/Kyle MillsKelvin Rivas has been the ace of the Oklahoma Baptist pitching staff this season, registering a 12-0 record with a 1.88 earned-run average amd striking out 141 batters.

No. 1 Bison looking to go out with a bang

“You’d love to go out on

top.”

OBU COACH BOBBY COX

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By Sean KramerOf the tribune

If anybody had to win last year’s Avista NAIA World Se-ries other than Faulkner, Pat-rick McCarthy seems to get a kick that it was Cumberland, the tournament’s No. 10 seed, which got it done.

Because all the Faulkner coach has to do is point to past results to make his point to his second-seeded Eagles this year:

Seeding doesn’t count for a thing when you get to Lew-iston. Anybody is capable of winning, anybody is capable of losing.

In the last four years, a No. 9 seed (Concordia in 2011) and a No. 10 seed (Cumberland last season) walked away with the national championship.

“So, any team can beat any team,” McCarthy said. “Ev-erybody’s got great pitching, everybody deserves to be out there. It’s tough.”

McCarthy brings enough experience into the Series to keep his players from getting complacent. Faulkner fielded a team two years ago worthy of the World Series’ No. 1 seed, and swept through five games to become champions in only their second Series ap-pearance.

Though only one player, re-lief pitcher Julian Esquibel, remains from the 2013 cham-pionship team.

It will be a new identity for the Eagles (48-13) even from

last season when they open this year’s tournament Saturday.

Faulkner will rely on pitch-ing and cerebral hitting up and down the lineup, with eight players hitting .290 or better, to attempt to make it two Se-ries crowns in three years.

“We’re not flashy,” McCarthy said. “There’s nobody who’s really going to stand out to you. But we play together as a team and everybody does things right. That’s what’s got us to this point.”

The Eagles still have play-ers worthy of the stage Harris

Field presents. Staff ace Jack Charleston

will likely take the mound Sat-urday for Faulkner’s opener. He’s responsible for only 11 runs over 86 innings of work, having struck out 77 batters and walking only 17.

Chris Madera leads things with the bat. Faulkner’s cen-ter fielder has a .458 on-base percentage with 40 extra-base hits and 50 stolen bases.

“He’s electric; he plays the game the right way,” McCar-thy said.

They perhaps aren’t some

of the World Series’ biggest stars, but they headline a deep roster which has allowed Faulkner to navigate through a difficult schedule.

Faulkner split four games against fellow Series partici-pant and No. 8-ranked Au-burn Montgomery, including a loss to the Warhawks in the SSAC tournament champion-ship game.

The Eagles finished 7-5 against teams that finished in the final coaches Top 25 poll, including back-to-back wins over No. 21 Campbellsville in the Montgomery Bracket to clinch their spot in the World

Series. Three of those losses came

by one run, the other two were three-run games, and the Ea-gles feel battle-tested enough because of it to make a run in Lewiston.

“Our philosophy has always been to play the best teams in the country, so we’re used to being in tight games,” McCarthy said. “Campbellsville would’ve been a well-deserving team to be in the World Series with the kind of pitching they have. It’s good to be in tight games. That way, when you’re in those games it’s just another day.”


s e e d f a u l k n e r2

fa u l k n e r s tat sBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVE. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SOChris Madera .386 223 68 86 17 5 8 44 27 28Robret Llera .370 165 15 61 16 0 9 52 23 18Nick Cain .337 190 27 64 13 0 8 43 19 48Dennis Morton .326 175 37 57 17 2 8 43 12 34Cody Sos .316 174 26 55 9 0 8 28 14 22Randy Joung .307 153 23 47 10 0 1 33 15 27Edgar Figueroa .293 167 39 49 4 1 2 21 28 33Alexis Torres .290 131 33 38 8 0 4 29 12 28Dario Polanco .265 155 38 41 6 4 5 23 23 39Junior Santos .250 80 33 20 3 1 1 10 12 18Kevin Torres .244 45 17 11 4 0 0 6 11 16Mario Amaral .234 64 10 15 7 0 0 10 9 13Mike Correa .172 64 9 11 2 0 1 8 14 17Jackson Webb .167 30 7 5 0 0 1 6 6 9Totals .305 1856 409 567 117 13 59 365 231 364Opponents .232 1858 185 431 69 6 15 168 108 452


ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOJack Charleston 1.15 9-1 86.0 56 20 11 17 77Alejandro Castro 1.54 3-2 35.0 29 7 6 7 26Christian Torres 2.09 6-1 51.2 41 14 12 13 69Victor Arche 2.35 11-2 72.2 64 24 19 10 67Tylier Campbell 2.70 0-0 10.0 10 3 3 4 11Phillip Anderson 2.80 8-2 80.1 74 32 25 15 79Brian Bass 2.81 301 32.0 28 13 10 7 30Kurt Lipscomb 3.07 6-2 55.2 48 26 19 12 42Patrick McGrady 3.12 0-0 26.0 22 12 9 2 20Vinny Lujan 5.47 1-1 24.2 22 19 15 11 18Totals 2.60 48-13 4890 413 184 141 105 447Opponents 6.92 13-46 472.0 564 412 363 235 365

Saves (14) — Alejandro Castro 9, Jack Charleston 4, Patrick McGrady.

Tribune/Kyle MillsThis season, Faulkner’s Chris Madera has gotten on base (he leads the team in hitting at .386) and then got himself into scoring position by stealing 50 bases (third-most in the NAIA), touching home plate 68 times.

Eagles are bracing for wide-open battle

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n FaulknerLocation: Montgomery, Ala.Nickname: EaglesCoach: Patrick McCarthy (sixth year)Season record: 48-13Rank in final NAIA poll: No. 10How qualified: Won Montgomery BracketNumber of previous appearances; best finish: three; first in 2013

> Juice (of five)STARTERS: nnnn½

These guys just know how to eat up innings, and it’s all led by Charleston and his beard. The sophomore threw 86 innings, conceding only 11 earned runs (seventh lowest in NAIA) while striking out 77. Arche and Anderson add sub-3 ERAs while Lipscomb checks in with a 3.07 ERA.RELIEvERS: nnn½

There’s no doubt Castro is Faulkner’s go-to out of the bullpen. He’s only given up six earned runs in 35 innings while striking out 26. Torres has come out of the bullpen nine times to go with his seven starts and has struck out 69. Mc-Grady has worked 26 innings with only two walks.

FIELDING: nnnThe Eagles’ team ERA of 2.60 ranks

third in the nation, but Faulkner has al-lowed 43 unearned runs this season.

HITTING: nnn½There isn’t one slugger who stands

out, but eight Eagles are hitting .290 or better through at least 131 at-bats. Chris Madera leads the way with a .386 aver-age and eight home runs. As a team the Eagles rank No. 13 in slugging and No. 21 in runs scored. They score just enough to support their stellar pitching staff.SPEED: nnnn

These aren’t the Eagles of two years ago who swiped 200-plus bases, but this team still has wings. They rank No. 5 with 136 stolen bases, 50 courtesy of Madera who’s been thrown out only nine times all season.

INTANGIBLES: nnnn½The Eagles are making their fourth

trip to Lewiston in the last five years and have a championship under their belt from just two years ago. Coach Patrick McCarthy claims fans in Lewiston will be treated to a team that does all the right things and plays as a team.

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s e e d t a b o r3

By TROY WARZOCHAOF THE TRIBUNE

They’re relatively new to the Avista NAIA World Series, they don’t boast a bona fide superstar and they’ve retooled nearly their entire program by adding 30 new players in the last year.

For many programs, that means rebuilding.

For the Tabor Bluejays, it means reloading.

Still a fresh name to many longtime Series watchers, the third-seed-ed Bluejays of Hillsboro, Kan., will make their sec-ond straight appearance in the double-elimina-tion tournament despite turning over a significant chunk of the roster fol-lowing last year’s inaugu-ral visit to Lewiston.

“We have a lot of new blood,” said Tabor coach Mark Standiford, who is in his seventh year at the helm of the Bluejays. “We brought in 30 total for

varsity and junior varsity players.

“We did return 10 se-niors, but for the most part we’ve got a whole new in-field. We brought two of our starters back, but oth-er than that, it’s a whole new pitching staff.”

One year after going 2-2 in its first Series ap-pearance, Tabor this time opens with Series regular and No. 6 seed Embry-Rid-dle. First pitch is sched-uled for 3 p.m. today.

On top of trotting out a slew of new faces, the Bluejays (53-10) may also get a couple of new glances from foes after finishing with the second-best win percentage in the NAIA and are coming off an exhausting Open-ing Round that saw them fight through several rain delays to beat perennial power Bellevue (Neb.).

After winning 28 of their first 30 games to open the season, the Blue-jays found themselves

n TaborLocation: Hillsboro, Kan.Nickname: BluejaysCoach: Mark Standiford (seventh year)Season record: 53-10Rank in final NAIA poll: No. 5How qualified: Won Bellevue BracketNumber of previous appearances; best

finish: one; finished 2-2

> Juice (of five)STARTERS: nnn½

At the top of the rotation sits Hurl-butt, who was the Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference Co-pitcher of the Year this season. Acevedo, a senior, is a solid No. 2 behind Hurlbutt.RELIEvERS: nn

Outside of Hurlbutt and Acevedo, the Bluejays pitching stats are far from gaudy. Renteria and Ebersole each had two saves this season.FIELDING: nnn½

Despite unveiling a completely new group of infielders this season, the Bluejays’ defense ranked 32nd in the NAIA and is far from being a deficiency.HITTING: nnnn

The Bluejays aren’t the most pow-erful team in the NAIA, but they could be one of the most balanced. Sigg, DeLeon and Couch each tallied more than 40 RBI this season and have the ability to lead by example.SPEED: nnnn

Tabor will run and run often. The Bluejays were sixth in the NAIA with 132 stolen bases in 2015. Neufeld and Baez led the charge with 26 thefts apiece.INTANGIBLES: nnn

After going 2-2 in their inaugural visit to Lewiston as a No. 9 seed last year, the Bluejays will try to improve on that — this time as a No. 3 seed. Having already faced a trio of win-or-go-home games in the Opening Round, Tabor feels as if it’s ready for one last weeklong grind.

Revamped Bluejays find their way back to 2nd Series

ta b o r s tat sBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVG. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SOManny Deleon .422 154 47 65 10 1 10 47 26 34Alex Couch .411 197 55 81 15 0 2 45 25 28Jean Acevedo .359 64 12 23 7 0 1 12 7 10Jerrik Sigg .349 192 57 67 9 5 11 54 25 37Michael Baca .345 232 59 80 10 5 6 32 16 22Colton Flax .344 151 21 52 11 0 4 43 21 16Gadiel Baez .344 151 21 52 11 0 4 43 21 16Matthew Molbury .310 145 9 45 8 0 5 39 31 27Pete Lelich .309 81 20 25 3 0 3 18 10 22Tanner Bell .300 110 26 33 8 1 2 29 19 28Brent McClure .275 131 34 36 7 0 4 27 21 21Armando Castillo .273 99 6 27 7 0 2 16 14 17Ryan Neufeld .265 49 44 13 1 1 2 13 5 4Braden Brown .244 45 14 11 1 0 0 5 5 9Totals .336 1856 476 624 110 15 59 421 250 313Opponents .247 1742 210 431 71 4 34 183 139 456


ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOGregory Turner 1.24 5-2 50.2 40 12 7 11 38Russell Longworth 2.51 11-3 89.2 86 38 25 7 87Dustin Hurlbutt 2.70 10-2 83.1 61 32 25 31 100Jean Acevedo 3.33 10-1 81.0 81 36 30 20 93Thomas Longworth 4.41 5-0 34.2 42 19 17 4 24Dylan Algra 4.46 5-1 36.1 35 19 18 16 31David Renteria 4.55 3-1 29.2 32 20 15 24 27Michael Ebersole 5.86 2-0 27.2 35 18 18 5 20Totals 3.15 53-10 462.1 432 209 162 139 456Opponents 7.47 10-53 440.0 620 474 365 250 312

Saves (6) — Michael Ebersole 2, Thomas Longworth, David Renteria 2, Gregory Turner.

Tribune/Kyle MillsPitcher Jean Acevedo is 10-1 and has struck out 93 batters.

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F R I D A Y, M A Y 2 2 , 2 0 1 5 2 0 1 5 N A I A W O R L D S E R I E S P R E V I E W / L E W I S T O N T R I B U N E 9

with their backs against the wall in the Opening Round — needing to win three in a row just to make it back to the Series after dropping a 3-1 deci-sion to Bellevue.

Tabor did just that, sandwiching a win over Mayville State (N.D.) be-tween two victories over Bellevue.

Considering how well the Bluejays began the season, the composure un-der pressure was a welcome sight, Standiford said.

“The expectations are al-ways high,” Standiford added. “We set that early in the fall and they understand what our goal is — to get to Lewiston. It’s been a bumpy road for a bit. It took a little while for everyone to get to know each other and learn each other’s roles, but the expectations never change.

“We have a very talented group. Obviously getting to the Series is a very difficult task. We were able to overcome some adversity and make it back.”

Statistically, Tabor is buoyed by a potent offense, a bend-but-don’t-break pitching staff and healthy dose of speed on the basepaths.

“One thing about our team, I don’t know if we actually have stars — espe-cially from an offensive standpoint,”

Standiford said. “A lot of it is spread around. I don’t think that we rely on one guy or one unit.”

As a group, the Bluejays are fifth in the NAIA in slugging percentage, sixth in runs scored and stolen bases and sev-enth in total RBI. Leading the way at the dish are junior utility man Manny De-Leon, junior infielder Alex Couch and sophomore center fielder Jerrik Sigg.

DeLeon hit .422, clubbed 10 home runs and knocked in 47 runs this season; Couch hit .411 with 15 doubles and 45 RBI; and Sigg provided the juice with 11 homers and 54 RBI.

On the hill, junior Dustin Hurlbutt is Tabor’s unques-tioned ace. This season, Hurl-butt earned Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference co-Pitcher of the Year honors after com-piling a 10-2 record with a 2.70 ERA and 100 strikeouts.

Behind Hurlbutt is senior southpaw Jean Acevedo, who is one of the few returners from last year and went 10-1 while fanning 93 in 81 innings this season.

“When you have that many new guys, being successful is going to be a tough challenge,” Standiford said. “These guys have been able to rise up and to meet that challenge.”

Mark Standiford

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n Lewis-Clark StateLocation: LewistonNickname: WarriorsCoach: Jeremiah Robbins (third

year)Season record: 41-11Rank in final NAIA poll: No. 12How qualified: Host berthNumber of previous

appearances; best finish: 33; first in 1984, 1985, 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1996, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008

> Juice (of five)STARTERS: nnnn

The trio of Jackson, Kerns and Sagendorf have proven their abilities. If the Warriors need a fourth starter, it’s not entirely clear who that will be.RELIEvERS: nn½

Plenty of options here, though none of the Warriors’ bullpen hurlers has been stu-pendous.FIELDING: nnnn½

The Warriors are solid and occasionally spectacular in the field. Their 58 total errors and fielding percentage of .970 are both stellar figures.HITTING: nnnnn

The Warriors have been club-bing homers at an old-school rate this season. Sure, they lead the NAIA with 89 dingers, but perhaps more impressive is the fact they rank fifth in program history with one homer hit per every 21.17 at-bats. The 2015 Warriors are in some heady company on that list.SPEED: nnn

LCSC has a strong ratio of 55 steals in 68 attempts, though this part of the game has been a bit diminished in light of the Warriors’ power surge.INTANGIBLES: nnnn½

That Warrior aura has regained some of its former brilliance during the program’s back-to-back runner-up finishes in this tournament. It’ll really feel like the old days if L-C slugs its way to national title No. 17.

By MATT BANEYOF THE TRIBUNE

In the last two Avista NAIA World Series, Lewis-Clark State has collected a total of seven wins in elimination games and finished runner-up both seasons.

Those are remarkable fig-ures, and they prove a team isn’t necessarily dead when it’s cast into the losers’ brack-et early in the tournament.

But there are certainly less perilous routes to a champion-ship, which is why third-year Warriors coach Jeremiah Robbins is taking a win-at-all-costs approach to his club’s opening game in this year’s Se-ries. Fourth-seeded LCSC will meet fifth-seeded Davenport of Michigan at Harris Field at approximately 7 tonight.

L-C plans on starting right-handed pitcher Ty Jackson, a powerful junior who became the team’s No. 1 starter dur-ing the latter part of the reg-ular season. But if Jackson encounters trouble, the War-riors won’t be shy about using

any of their hurlers in relief — even usual starters Beau Kerns and Nick Sagendorf.

“We’re all in,” said Robbins, whose teams lost on Saturday in each of the last two Series. “As a poker player would say, we’re all in on Game 1. ... Every one (of the pitchers) will have their cleats on, I know that much.”

Why is the opener so impor-tant? The winner of tonight’s tilt will get a pass to the Mon-day evening game and be as-sured of staying in the Series until at least Tuesday. The loser will suddenly find itself in an elimination contest at noon Saturday.

Plus, as the Warriors have learned the last two seasons, fighting through the losers’ bracket severely taxes a pitch-ing staff. “You’re chasing an arm throughout the tourna-ment,” Robbins said.

LCSC (41-11) will need its well-defined trio of starters and its interchangeable reliev-ers to pitch well, but its robust offense will likely give the hurl-ers some margin for error.

The Warriors lead the NAIA

in home runs (89) and hits per game (11.8), and are second in runs per game (8.8). This has probably been their most impressive offensive team since their last championship club in 2008.

Junior slugger Seth Brown leads the NAIA with 22 hom-ers and L-C with 73 RBI, but he certainly isn’t the only threat in the lineup. The War-riors have gotten home runs from 17 players, six of whom have blasted seven or more.

“At any given moment, any one of our guys can hit a home run, so it’s pretty exciting to be a part of,” said Brown, a 220-pounder from Medford, Ore.

Cabe Reiten, a junior transfer from Gonzaga, is the Warriors’ top average man among the regulars at .421, and Ty Jack-son, whether he’s pitching or playing a position, bats at a .341 clip with 49 RBI. Max Whitt is No. 2 on the team, and No. 10 nationally, with 15 homers.

And even if all of the players mentioned above have an off-game, other Warriors are ca-pable of picking up the slack.

Kerns (10-1 record, 2.77 ERA) has been a bankable starter throughout the season and could make cameos as a reliever (the role he had last season). Jackson settled into a starter’s role about a month into the season, and has a 1.83 ERA (which is at 1.29 over his last six appearances).

The Warriors, whose ros-ter was significantly retooled during the offseason, had good moments throughout the season, but seemed to make a breakthrough when they swept league rival British Co-lumbia in late April.

“The UBC series was a de-fining moment for our team, and I told them that when we were done,” Robbins said. “They had a different look in their eyes. ... I saw a group of guys come together as one.”

Tribune/Kyle MillsTy Jackson has emerged as the Warriors’ top starter, going 7-1 with a 1.83 ERA and 59 strikeouts.

Warriors go ‘all in’ from the get-go

l e w i s - c l a r k s tat e s tat sBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVG. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SOKasey Chapan .467 15 3 7 2 0 1 3 2 2Cabe Reiten .421 216 68 91 19 4 7 41 21 23Cameron Pongs .381 63 12 24 6 0 4 27 10 8Seth Brown .378 209 70 79 17 1 22 73 29 24Robert Smith .369 84 18 31 10 0 3 22 5 13Ty Jackson .341 179 35 61 13 2 7 49 15 37Julian Ramon .320 103 5 33 4 0 1 10 9 8Raymond Pedrina .313 144 48 45 8 3 7 32 18 33Zach Holley .313 96 31 30 3 1 1 8 5 20Max Whitt .304 191 51 58 7 2 15 66 24 20Darren Kolk .300 90 13 27 3 0 5 16 9 16Chadwick Kaalekahi .294 68 3 20 8 0 1 11 11 16Michael Sexton .291 148 25 43 12 1 7 34 10 29Matt Becker .273 33 16 9 1 0 0 2 5 8Andris Rizquez .258 62 10 16 1 0 1 9 4 16Willie Allen .242 91 12 22 2 1 4 17 6 26Chase Hafer .195 41 27 8 0 0 0 2 3 16Totals .326 1884 462 615 118 15 89 431 193 328Opponents .251 1687 221 424 62 11 18 199 174 365


ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOTy Jackson 1.83 7-1 64 49 19 13 15 59Dakota Cortese 1.88 1-1 14.1 13 5 3 10 19Dillon Keene 1.98 5-0 27.1 20 6 6 13 20Colton Wright 2.16 1-0 16.2 11 6 4 2 9Nick Sagendorf 2.68 4-1 40.1 38 17 12 8 40Beau Kerns 2.77 10-1 81.1 68 29 25 16 66JT Kaul 3.48 0-0 10.1 8 4 4 8 7Bryce Jackson 3.86 1-0 16.1 16 11 7 4 7Peter Irvin 3.90 2-1 27.2 24 15 12 19 25Cameron Pongs 4.24 2-1 34 38 20 16 16 23Adrian Martinez 4.29 4-3 35.2 41 20 17 12 18Josh Benjamin 4.61 1-0 13.2 14 8 7 4 14Quin Grogan 5.54 2-2 37.1 37 26 23 26 35Micah Brown 8.62 1-0 15.2 22 17 15 10 11Totals 3.56 41-11 447 424 221 177 174 365Opponents 7.58 11-41 437 615 462 368 193 328

Saves (14) — Joe Mello 2, Keene, Wright 4, Sagendorf 2, Kaul, Pongs 4.


S E E D D A V E N P O R T5

By BYRON EDELMANOF THE TRIBUNE

Used to playing in front of several hundred fans, Davenport will make its Avista NAIA World Series debut tonight playing before as many as 5,000 fans.

“I’m assuming most of them won’t be cheering for us,” said Panthers coach Kevin Tidey, whose squad will face reigning national runner-up Lew-is-Clark State tonight at 7 at Harris Field in what promises to be one of the tourna-ment’s most well-at-tended tilts.

“An average home crowd, we’re lucky to play in front of more than 100 or 200,” said Tidey, who added that his team has never played in front of more than 400. “So it’s a tremendous challenge and if we’re going to be good, it’s definitely the right game to make a statement.”

The Panthers, hoping to mitigate the crowd factor by scoring early, rank No. 2 in the NAIA in batting av-erage and for much of the year, their four-hole hitter, Matt Priebe, led the NAIA in hitting before his marks slid to .378 toward the end of the season because of injury.

One of 11 Davenport seniors, Bren-dan Bender notched 10 homers this year and Cam Cooper leads the team with a .427 plate average. Another re-liable offensive weapon, Connor Sey-mour, ought to present a threat for the

See PANTHERS, page 14>

Panthers jump right into Series fi re against L-C

Brendan Bender has hit 10 home runs for the Panthers this season.

Matt Priebe

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By MATT BANEYOF THE TRIBUNE

Predicting when a home run will be hit is a fruitless endeavor. There was Babe Ruth’s called shot in the 1932 World Series ... and that’s pretty much the entire list of suc-cessfully prognosticated dingers.

(And even that Great Bambino tale might be apocryphal.)

But what the heck, here’s a forecast for this week’s Avista NAIA World Series: More homers will rocket out of Harris Field in this tournament than were hit in the last four Series at the Lewiston ballpark.

Actually, a power surge in this Series wouldn’t be by happenstance — it would be by design.

This season, all levels of college base-ball switched to a redesigned baseball with seams .017 inches flatter than the previous ball. That might not seem like a drastic change, but when the new ball soars through the air, it encounters less drag and therefore carries a bit farther.

People in college baseball will tell you flatly that the new ball was introduced to increase home runs. (The term “juiced” — kind of a loaded term in this sport — is sometimes used to describe the ball.)

For decades, the college game was more offensive than what was seen in Ma-jor League Baseball, primarily because of the use of peppy aluminum bats. College games with both teams scoring in the teens were common.

So in 2011, the powers that be at the NCAA Division I level — that group drives all of these changes — decided to deaden the bats. The new, thicker-walled BBCOR bats don’t have quite the “trampoline ef-fect” that the old BESR bats had.

The goal was to make the game safer, since line drives hit with the new bat aren’t quite as laserlike, and to cut down on the glut of home runs. The change was perhaps too effective on that latter count. At the NCAA Division I level, there was an aver-age of .94 homers per game in 2010, and

that dipped to as low as .36 per game in ’14.The homer history during Lewiston’s

run as Series host nicely illustrates the effect on the NAIA game. Of the 23 na-tional tournaments staged at Harris Field — whose dimensions have remained un-changed for decades — the three smallest homer totals have all come in the last four years. Last season’s total of 11 bombs is the smallest ever for a Lewiston Series.

The homer dropoff has been even more pronounced at the NCAA’s College World Series. That tournament in Omaha, Neb., moved into the spacious TD Ameritrade Park in 2011 — the same year as the bat switch — and in the four tournaments since, there have been a grand total of 25 homers. That includes a paltry three in both ’13 and ’14.

“The motivation for it all came from Omaha,” Lewis-Clark State athletic direc-tor Gary Picone said. “Just about every broadcast you listened to talked about how you couldn’t hit a home run. Obviously, that’s the greatest exposure college base-ball gets, so they needed to do something.”

Juicing the bats was off the table

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Dingers take a nosedive at the SeriesHomers have long been a staple of the NAIA World Series during its time at Lewiston’s

Harris Field (1984-91, 2000-present). But following the switched to less-potent BBCOR bats in 2011, the number of bombs hit in the Series took a noticeable dip. This year’s tournament could be in for a home run revival, thanks to the flatter-seamed balls that made their debut this season.

Seasonsusing the

BBCOR bats

Flatter-seamed baseballs being used this season have increased homers without bringing back head-spinning numbers of the past

NCAAProfessor Lloyd Smith poses in front of metal bats in the lab at Washington State University’s School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering.

Longball revivalbecause of the safety issue. So about two years ago, the NCAA started looking into altering the ball.

The organization asked the Sports Science Laboratory at Washington State University — located in Pullman, 32 miles north of Lewiston — to test the perfor-mance of a flatter-seamed baseball.

“Our first reply was, ‘Well, we can, but we kind of already know the answer,’ ” said Lloyd Smith, director of the lab and a mechanical engineering professor at WSU.

The lab had already tested softballs with different seam heights, and Smith’s staff expected to find the same results with a baseball. They tested the ball in their laboratory and in bat-ting cages, with both machines and people involved. They also tested the new ball at Houston’s Minute Maid Park, with the retractable roof closed to be certain that high wind didn’t affect the experiments.

Generally speaking, Smith’s team found that the new ball sailed about 20 feet farther than an old ball hit about 350 feet.

“The goal in lowering the seam was you wouldn’t change the speed of the ball as it was traveling in the ... infield, so that the catcher and the infield players would really see the ball as they’ve been seeing it,” Smith said. “As far as the distance you’re hitting the ball, you’re kind of back to where you were.”

And indeed, homers have taken a jump this season at all levels of the college game. In the NAIA, 20 teams hit 40 or more homers this season; last year, only 10 clubs reached that mark.

Yet it’s not quite like the BESR-bat days when just about anyone could poke a ball out of the park.

“It seems like they’ve kind of hit that proper medium,” Picone said, “so when somebody is capable of hitting 20 home

runs, they can, but everybody on the team is not capable of hitting 10.”

With Year One of the new ball almost in the books, it seems that most are pleased with its effect on the game.

“I think this (change) pretty much evened it out,” said Boyd Pitkin, head coach at Briar Cliff of Iowa and president of the NAIA Baseball Coaches Associa-tion. “You still have the small ball that’s being played, obviously, but you’re also having the opportunity to not have to do that and let guys swing away.”

What about pitchers? Don’t they object to a ball that sails farther?

Probably, but the lower-seamed ball also causes fewer blisters. And breaking pitches with the new ball have “faster movement,” LCSC coach Jeremiah Robbins said.

Plus, the college ball is now similar to the ball used in the minor leagues — a realm many of these players are hoping to reach — and closer to the MLB ball, which has even flatter seams.

“I think it develops pitching more, too,” Robbins said. “I think there was a time period where you could just huck a fastball up there as hard as you can and, if you had upper velocities, you were going to have success with it. Where now, guys got to pitch.”

The Warriors’ Seth Brown leads the NAIA with 22 home runs and is, not sur-prisingly, in favor of the change.

“When they went to the first year of the BBCOR bat, the home run just drastically was ... gone,” the junior slugger said. “From a fan’s standpoint and a player’s standpoint, you can’t take that much offense away from the game. I think it’s definitely a good deci-sion. I think it’s awesome.”

———Baney may be reached at [email protected] or

at (208) 848-2258.

WITH A NEW ‘JUICED’ ORB IN PLAY, THE NAIA WORLD SERIES IS HOPING TO SEE A ...

Hilary Scheinuk/Associated PressLouisiana State coach Paul Mainieri shows the new fl at-seam baseball (left), and a ball from last year.

Seth Brown

Panthers — even after he took a 92-mph fastball to the head earlier this year.

“I think obviously, we’ve got good hit-ters,” Tidey said, “but my hitting coach is pretty good, too.”

For nearly two de-cades, Doug Wabeke coached Grand Rapids Community College’s baseball team, winning four junior-college na-tional titles and coaching Tidey from 1990-91.

“So when I got the job, I went and talked him out of retirement,” said Tidey, who noted that his former coach still brings plenty of energy to the ballpark.

“It’s funny because he coaches third and I’ll be in the dugout and I’ll say about 80 percent of the time, I’ll say to another coach what signs he’s going to give here, and they (the other coaches) will say, ‘How does he know that?’

“We’re definitely on the same page.”Sporting the lowest earned-run aver-

age on the team, Jonathan Cheshire car-ries a 1.38 ERA and owns 14 saves for the


D AV E N P O R T S TAT SBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVG. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SOCam Cooper .427 96 36 41 3 2 1 20 10 8Brendan Bender .411 197 50 81 13 5 10 61 28 16Zac Wilson .387 181 47 70 7 3 2 25 17 19Matt Priebe .378 217 43 82 21 1 5 60 19 31Zack Sardellitti .370 189 9 79 18 2 1 49 14 10Dre Celestin .364 140 39 51 8 2 1 24 27 17Connor Seymour .341 173 44 59 8 5 4 42 22 15Ryan Manning .340 106 26 36 8 2 0 20 7 18Jordan Zylstra .328 192 53 63 11 8 2 38 20 18Brandon Cable .312 157 27 49 9 1 2 34 15 29Nolan Wilson .296 71 3 21 7 0 0 15 4 13Cody Greear .288 104 20 30 9 1 2 12 14 14Tyler Baratono .316 38 14 12 1 0 0 5 3 9Matt Hoge .233 43 51 10 1 0 0 4 7 7Totals .352 1953 499 688 126 34 30 422 212 235Opponents .243 1821 180 442 55 14 12 162 116 358


ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOJonathan Cheshire 1.38 1-2 65 45 12 10 8 49Brendan Bender 1.44 8-1 68.2 54 13 11 15 43Corey Murphy 1.89 9-4 85.2 81 31 18 12 70Ryan Butzer 2.60 5-1 52 45 17 15 11 23Corbin Clouse 2.82 4-1 38.1 37 19 12 13 33Corey Sessions 3.21 5-0 33.2 38 14 12 11 19Alex Schuiling 3.35 6-0 37.2 35 16 14 8 33Anthony Alarcon 3.41 6-0 34.1 35 16 13 11 22Jerry Ferris 4.29 6-1 42 52 26 20 12 43Brandon MacKinnon 4.74 1-0 19 13 11 10 11 19Totals 2.61 51-10 482.1 442 180 140 116 358Opponents 7.76 10-51 464 688 499 400 212 235

Saves (15) — Cheshire 14, Butzer.

DavenportLocation: Grand Rapids, Mich.

Nickname: Panthers

Coach: Kevin Tidey (fourth year)

Season record: 51-10

Rank in fi nal NAIA poll: No. 6

How qualifi ed: Won Grand Rapids Bracket

Number of previous appearances; best fi nish: fi rst appearance

> Juice (out of fi ve)STARTERS:

The top pair of athletes out of Davenport’s six-man mound rotation, Murphy and Bender, complement each other as a solid one-two punch — both possess-ing velocity and a savvy mix of looks.RELIEVERS:

One cool cat, Cheshire leads the team with 14 saves and a 1.38 ERA.FIELDING: ½

As likely to provide a

web gem as a gaffe, the Panthers are like your son or daughter — likely to amaze you one moment and horrify you the next. Catcher Sardellitti provides a steady hand behind home plate. HITTING:

As a team, the Panthers rank No. 2 in the NAIA in slugging percentage. Coo-per bats .427 and Bender also bats in Ted Williams, range, with a .411 rate.SPEED:

While the Panthers eschew stealing bases, they do “a lot of situ-ational things,” in Tidey’s words. So you must remain heads-up at all times when defending Davenport. INTANGIBLES: ½

At the end of a game, Tidey’s lineup card looks like “chicken scratch” since the Panthers use the NAIA re-entry rule liberally. Be warned: If you keep a scorecard for the Panthers, you might work up a sweat.

PANTHERSContinued from PAGE 11>

Panthers while Corey Murphy leads the team in strikeouts with 70 and Bender carries the second-lowest ERA.

“Pitching, we’ve kind of been going back and forth; we have dual No. 1s,” Tidey said, noting that Murphy and Bend-

er resemble each other on the mound. “They can both throw multiple pitches for strikes, they’re not overpowering but they both have three or four pitches they can throw on any count, and I think that’s been a key to their success.”

Kevin Tidey

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S E E D E M B R Y - R I D D L E6

By JOSH WRIGHTOF THE TRIBUNE

Embry-Riddle coach Ran-dy Stegall played for Woody Hunt at Cumberland from 1997-1998 and returned a few years later as an assis-tant. He’s honored to call Hunt a friend and a mentor.

So when Hunt took time the other day to impart some wisdom about the Eagles’ fi-nal foray at the Avista NAIA World Series, Stegall paid special attention.

The coaching legend’s advice: Soak it in. Enjoy it. Take time to reflect.

“We haven’t won the whole thing, but just like any other team that has been out there, we’ve developed a lot of good memories,” Stegall said.

The Eagles will become an NCAA Division II pro-gram in all sports next year, a move that was initiated three years ago. The news became official last March, just before Stegall’s club fell one win shy of the World Series — its first season without a trip to Lewiston since 2007.

In their last season in the NAIA, Embry-Riddle coaches put pressure

on themselves to return to the Series. They were sure, though, to stay cool in front of their players — all the way until they dispatched Rio Grande last week in the Opening Round title game.

“That’s why last year hurt so bad,” Stegall said, “be-cause I knew we only had one more shot at it. So the whole summer were thinking about it, and we were kind of sell-ing out trying to get the best team we could here.”

The Eagles are making their 13th appearance at the Series, the seventh in eight years under Stegall, but they looked unlikely to return in early March. They were barely over .500 and had lost five of six games.

But Embry-Riddle is 27-7 since March 8. The big dif-ference, Stegall said, is im-proved defense sparked by

a switch that the coach was forced to make.

Shortstop Enderson Velasquez hurt his ankle in late March, prompting Stegall to move third baseman Jake Cavender to replace him. Cavender’s

Eagles savoring their fi nal trip to Lewiston

TribuneEmbry-Riddle starter Stetson Nelson is 9-4 this season with a 1.52 ERA and 97 strikeouts. He also leads the NAIA in innings pitched with 124.

“That’s why last year

hurt so bad, because I knew we only had one more

shot at it.”

RANDY STEGALL

See ERAU, page 16>

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improved range helped the team so much that when Velasquez returned, Stegall kept Cavender at short and moved Velasquez to third.

“Over the last half of the sea-son, I think it was the key move to allow us to get back to Lewis-ton, to be honest,” Stegall said. “I think that’s the one thing that allowed us to get back.”

The Eagles are usually in good shape when they field well. They have two top-notch starters in Stetson Nelson — who led the NAIA in innings pitched at 124 — and Tyler Cyr, a hard-throwing junior whom Stegall expects to be drafted in June.

Meanwhile, reliever/spot starter Zac Grotz allowed the fewest earned runs (5) among all eligible NAIA pitchers.

ERAU’s pitching staff bene-fits from the school’s spacious ballpark, located close to the Atlantic Ocean, which brings a breeze that blows into the sta-

dium. The Eagles played host to the Opening Round tourna-ment for seventh straight time last week.

Those same conditions, however, mean the Eagles’ hitters scarcely hit home runs. They mustered 15 long balls as a team, compared to nine for opponents this year.

Still, Stegall likes his lineup with burner Tobias Moreno at

leadoff and Liam Goodall and Velasquez in the middle of the order.

“We’re going to have to get singles, doubles and try to maintain some kind of mo-mentum as the Series pro-gresses,” Stegall said. “It will be one of those things where we don’t rely on a home run. It just will just be doubles, steal-ing bags, taking extra bases.”

2 0 1 5 n a i a w o r l d s e r i e s p r e v i e w / l e w i s t o n t r i b u n e F r i d a Y, M a Y 2 2 , 2 0 1 516

E m b r y- r i d d l E s tat sBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVG. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SOEnderson Velasquez .377 199 41 75 11 0 1 34 23 15Liam Goodall .375 216 50 81 9 6 3 59 25 25Tobias Moreno .373 212 51 79 11 2 1 32 24 20Joshua Garcia .333 216 40 72 11 3 1 46 7 11Dalton Hughes .312 77 2 24 6 3 1 22 4 20Jake Cavender .308 214 49 66 13 5 1 36 30 28Jordan Brown .294 68 11 20 4 0 1 22 6 17Kyle Buchanan .292 171 43 50 8 3 3 30 22 35Matt Jacobs .281 167 36 47 17 2 3 37 22 34Ryan Maxon .220 59 2 13 2 0 0 4 9 14Hunter Bruehl .202 99 10 20 3 0 0 8 15 18Kyle Zirbes .200 65 36 13 2 1 0 8 8 25A.J. Mazzurco .174 46 12 8 3 0 0 2 17 20Cody Bogart .172 64 3 11 0 0 0 2 7 20Totals .307 1900 394 584 102 25 15 345 220 313Opponents .240 1780 238 427 57 9 9 189 188 438


ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOZac Grotz 0.65 8-1 69.0 40 7 5 12 79Stetson Nelson 1.52 9-4 124.0 101 37 21 26 97Tyler Cyr 3.27 7-4 77.0 61 46 28 47 88Clayton Wagner 4.12 6-1 67.2 75 38 31 23 45Corey Tufts 4.60 8-4 72.1 73 49 37 22 80Dylan Demarest 8.31 0-3 17.1 22 21 16 17 7Austen Thrailkill 12.91 0-0 7.2 8 12 11 12 10Totals 3.29 39-17 473.0 424 238 173 188 438Opponents 5.79 17-39 465.0 584 394 299 222 317

Saves (10) — Zac Grotz 9, Clayton Wagner.

Embry-RiddleLocation: Daytona Beach, Fla.Nickname: EaglesCoach: Randy Stegall (eighth year)Season record: 39-17Rank in final NAIA poll: 16thHow qualified: Won Daytona Beach BracketNumber of previous appearances; best finish: 13; second in 2005

> Juice (of five)STARTERS: ½

Nelson fashioned a 1.52 ERA while leading the NAIA in innings pitched, while No. 2 starter Cyr intrigues MLB scouts with his mid-90s velocity. And in the it’s-not-fair category, nasty reliever Zac Grotz completed two of the four games he started.RELIEvERS:

Depth is a concern, but Grotz allowed just five earned runs in 69 innings and compiled nine saves. His 0.65 ERA is second-best in the nation. Yet the same question looms for him as it does the Eagles’ starters: How will they fare outside their friendly home park?

FIELDING: ½After a shaky start, ERAU’s de-

fense was much improved late in the year. The key? Moving third baseman Cavender to shortstop after Velasquez was injured. HITTING:

The Eagles don’t mash the ball, but they have a strong mid-dle of the order. Tobias Moreno, Liam Goodall and Velasquez all hit over .370 (with Goodall flirting with .400 for much of the year). Moreno sets the tone as an aggressive lefty leadoff man.SPEED:

ERAU has five players with double-digit stolen bases, led by Moreno’s 27. But it’s not just the Eagles’ steals that hurt other teams; they’re always looking to grab an extra base after any hit or defensive miscue.INTANGIBLES:

The Eagles return just five players from their last Series team in ’13, but something tells us this club will play through Memorial Day, and then some, in its last trip to Lewiston before becoming an NCAA Division II program.

ErauContinued from PagE 15>

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COFFEE AND TEA SHOP

DELI

DELIVERY SERVICE

ASIANGOLDEN DRAGON ................................ 208-743-1952Open Tuesday–Sunday: 11:30am–9:30pm. Mandarin, Szechwan & Cantonese cuisine. Try our famous Hungry Guy Special. Orders to go. www.goldendragonlewiston.com2134 4th Ave. North, Lewiston (Near Hwy 95)

THAI GARDEN ..................................... 509-758-1388Open 7 days a week: Monday thru Thursday 11am–9pm; Friday & Saturday 11am–10pm; Sunday Noon–9pm. Chinese and Thai Cuisine. We also make orders to go. We deliver!508 Diagonal Street, Clarkston

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FAMILY DINING Continued

MEXICAN

SPORTS BAR

SWEETS AND TREATS

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448048EV-15

By JOSH WRIGHTOF THE TRIBUNE

If there’s a school that can come close to rivaling Lewis-Clark State’s tradition and suc-cess at the NAIA level, maybe it’s Lindsey Wilson College. The Blue Raiders have nine national titles to their name in one sport, including a four-peat from 1998 to 2001.

That Lindsey Wilson won these crowns in men’s soccer and not baseball is only par-tially irrelevant in explaining the school’s first Avista NAIA World Series appearance.

Coach Jonathan Burton, who’s authored a masterful turnaround at the Columbia, Ky., school, likely wouldn’t have jumped from Trevecca Nazarene — where he spent 11 years as a player, assis-tant and head coach — if not for Lindsey Wilson’s commit-ment to athletics.

The men’s soccer champi-onships are just one manifes-tation of the administration’s support, Burton said. Lindsey Wilson also advanced to the NAIA softball World Series, which opens today in Sioux City, Iowa, while the women’s

soccer club captured the na-tional title in December.

“It will always be a place that I love and I had a lot of special memories there,” Burton said of Trevecca. “But this was an opportunity to go somewhere that I felt we could get to a World Series and possibly win one. We’ve had a great run in the first four years here.”

Burton took over in 2012 af-ter Lindsey Wilson went 20-24 the previous year. He imme-diately led the Blue Raiders to their first Opening Round and finished with a 43-16 record.

In ’13, Lindsey Wilson won 45 games, the most in program history. And this year, the school with around 2,700 students rolled through ranked Freed-Hardeman and Tennessee Wesleyan in the Opening Round to book a spot in the Series.

The Blue Raiders are 15-2

since mid-April, in large part because of dynamite starting pitching. Ace Scott Sebald is 10-3 with 1.07 ERA, the sixth-best mark in the nation. Ryan Hart-man is 10-2 with 103 strikeouts (and just 19 walks). They’ve combined to give up just three home runs on the year.

Following them in the rotation is Chris Erker, the program’s top starter in 2013 before missing 2014 after Tommy John surgery. Burton said Erker has been at his best over his last four starts.

“Those guys have kept us in every game and given us a chance to win every game,,” Burton said. “And that’s ulti-mately … gotten us where we are — our starting pitching and defense too.”

Lindsey Wilson’s offense is headlined by senior right

fielder Alex Bautista, one of the NAIA’s offensive stars. He ranks in the top 10 nationally in five major statistical cat-egories, including home runs (19), RBI (72) and runs scored

(69). He boasts an on-base percentage of .477 and has swiped 27 bases.

Bautista, a native of Brooklyn who was attracted to Lindsey Wilson’s small-town campus, has drawn interest from Ma-jor League Baseball scouts after making a

huge leap this season.“Everything that he didn’t

do well last year; he’s done great this year,” Burton said. “He’s put in the time in the cage. He’s put the time and the extra hours in the field. I mean, he’s done everything he could do to become a com-plete player.”


S E E D L I N D S E Y W I L S O N7

L I N D S E Y W I L S O N S TAT SBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVG. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SORyan Harper .400 105 23 42 13 0 1 22 9 14Alex Bautista .383 206 69 79 13 3 19 72 24 33Brandon Munoz .356 222 58 79 9 2 2 36 12 14Victor Nazario .332 187 45 62 16 1 5 46 16 43Fabian Chirino .308 198 38 61 10 3 8 48 16 43Aaron Ashton .307 202 42 62 14 2 7 54 17 56Edgar Lebron .293 174 38 51 6 3 1 21 16 26Daryl Blaskovich .284 148 38 42 7 1 2 24 15 20Kory Weeks .263 80 23 21 1 1 1 12 7 17Steven Parades .260 123 24 32 9 2 1 14 10 29Russ Morse .222 36 3 8 3 0 0 11 3 7Dustin Woody .214 131 2 28 3 1 0 16 11 21Totals .311 1850 435 576 104 19 47 380 160 330Opponents .253 1753 214 443 72 12 21 192 129 429


ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOScott Sebald 1.07 10-3 92.2 80 20 11 14 87Ryan Hartman 2.04 10-2 92.2 70 25 21 19 103Matt Lashlee 3.17 5-0 48.1 59 20 17 8 37Chris Erker 3.87 7-5 76.2 86 46 33 23 66Carlos Pena 4.21 3-3 51.1 37 26 24 49 5Aaron Pearcy 4.28 2-0 27.1 31 16 13 4 28James Roll 5.40 1-2 28.1 34 29 17 9 20Aaron Doughty 6.23 0-2 26.0 25 24 18 15 21Totals 3.13 40-18 459.1 438 214 160 129 429Opponents 6.75 18-40 453.2 576 435 340 162 328

Saves (11) — Chris Erker, Ryan Hartman, Matt Lashlee, Carlos Pena 3, James Roll 5.

Lindsey WilsonLocation: Columbia, Ky.Nickname: Blue RaidersCoach: Jonathan Burton (fourth year)Season record: 41-17Rank in fi nal NAIA poll: Un-rankedHow qualifi ed: Won Kingsport BracketNumber of previous appear-ances: None

> Juice (of fi ve)STARTERS:

Sebald and Hartman combined for 20 wins and 190 strikeouts. And after them, Erker — the Blue Raiders’ No. 1 starter in 2013

before Tommy John surgery — awaits Series opponents.RELIEVERS: ½

Closer Pena collected just three saves and a 4.21 ERA, and setup man Sam Ross (torn MCL) was lost early in the year. The Blue Raiders rely on their starters to go deep in games.FIELDING: ½

LWC’s steady defense is a big reason why its pitching staff posted the 12th-best ERA in the nation (3.13). The club committed 84 errors, 20 of which were from shortstop Chorino.HITTING: ½

The Blue Raiders take pride in manufacturing runs, and they aren’t likely to wow anyone

with their power … except when Bautista is up to bat. The senior rocketed 19 home runs, good for third nationally and 11 more than any of his teammates.

SPEED: ½LWC was in the top 20 national-

ly in stolen bases (112) and triples (19). It has speed and a hyper-ag-gressive mindset. Bautista’s 27 steals led the team.

INTANGIBLES: The Blue Raiders won 15 of 17

games to close the season. With their superb starting pitching and huge bat in the middle of the lineup in Bautista, a Series run wouldn’t be shocking.

Burton’s hardball crew looking to add to school’s athletic accomplishments

Alex Bautista

Enjoying the NAIA World Series Since 1982!!

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S E E D C O N C O R D I A8

By BYRON EDELMANOF THE TRIBUNE

To earn the right to take part in this year’s Avista NAIA World Series, Concordia traveled the thorn-iest road one can take to get to Lewiston: the Oklahoma City bracket.

Battling through the top-ranked team in the nation — in their own backyard — the Eagles ousted a team from the postseason many considered the odds-on favorite to claim a national title.

A week ago, Ryan Land’s walk-off base hit in the bottom of the 10th eliminated Oklahoma City from fulfilling its preordained title march and delivered the Eagles back to Lewiston for the first time since 2011, when Concordia won its only na-tional title.

Concordia will open the Series today at noon, squaring off with St. Thomas

at Harris Field. Setting an NAIA record for saves,

Concordia pitcher Tyler Mark counts 23 saves to his credit this year — and he “gave us a chance to win (against

Oklahoma City),” Eagles coach Mike Grahovac said.

Allowing just one hit while working the final three frames of the Opening Round finale, Mark notched seven of his season’s 64 strikeouts against the Stars and “he’s probably been one of the most domi-nant pitchers in the NAIA in a long time,” Grahovac added of Marks, a righty possessing plenty of power and an insa-

tiable desire to get in the game — ev-ery game, if possible.

“When I say he’s one of the most dominant pitchers, that’s also being quoted to me by opposing coaches after they see him pitch,” Grahovac

Concordia UniversityConcordia reliever Tyler Mark set an NAIA record this season with 23 saves.

Eagles return for 1st time since ’11 title march

See CONCORDIA, page 20>

Mike Grahovac

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C o n C o r d i a s tat sBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVG. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SORyan Goodman .314 220 60 69 8 4 1 24 41 21Mitchell Esser .312 218 43 68 15 3 6 52 33 35Neil Lawhorn .304 181 17 55 12 1 7 33 19 30Robert Shiroky .292 212 38 62 14 5 5 47 26 44Ryan Land .284 116 31 33 4 3 0 11 10 21Kyle Jones .283 127 24 36 5 0 0 14 12 19John Bornhop .283 127 16 36 6 1 3 21 9 17Spencer Nielsen .280 186 26 52 7 4 2 29 13 32Luke Van Holten .273 55 4 15 0 0 1 8 7 10Atlee Schwab .267 135 16 36 9 0 2 20 17 19Dane Vande Guchte .246 130 23 32 9 1 1 22 19 9Daniel Shine .230 61 5 14 1 0 0 10 7 10John Doering .220 123 32 27 4 1 1 13 14 21Matt Horton .211 38 14 8 1 1 0 5 7 7Totals .280 1993 366 559 96 24 29 317 245 309Opponents .252 2031 248 512 96 14 33 230 171 404


ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOTyler Mark 1.30 5-1 48.1 28 7 7 9 64Garrett Kraemer 2.02 2-0 35.2 34 13 8 13 25Isaiah Terrazas 2.51 6-2 86 70 27 24 24 63Robbie Ingram 2.70 7-3 73.1 67 28 22 17 51Logan Comphel 2.81 1-0 25.2 22 13 8 10 25Dillon Moran 3.63 9-4 84.1 89 40 34 17 64Nick Boyett 3.89 7-1 39.1 44 20 17 6 15Collin Orellana 5.04 6-2 60.2 60 39 34 35 37Jose Cardona 5.14 0-1 14 18 9 8 2 9Spencer Moran 5.15 3-2 64.2 68 41 37 28 49Totals 3.42 47-16 542 512 248 206 171 407Opponents 4.95 16-47 523.2 559 366 288 245 308

Saves (24) — Mark 23, Boyett.

ConcordiaLocation: Irvine, Calif.Nickname: EaglesCoach: Mike Grahovac (seventh

year)Season record: 47-16Rank in final NAIA poll: No. 19How qualified: Won Oklahoma

City BracketNumber of previous appearance;

best finish: two; first in 2011

> Juice (out of five)STARTERS:

Terrazas and Dillon Moran combined to throw 127 strikeouts so far this year while a pair of lefties, Ingram and Orrelana, rely more on their ball-placement to craftily retire their foes through induced flyouts and groundouts.

Unrelated to Dillon Moran, Spen-cer Moran won a junior-college state championship last year at Orange Coast College and brings a bulldog mentality to the mound for the Eagles. RELIEvERS:

Sidearm hurler Boyett can throw every day — so you might see a lot of him. If the Eagles jump out to an early lead, they might insert Comphel, whereas Kraemer is more of a one-inning closer FIELDING:

You can call it their 6-4 punch: Second baseman Goodman and shortstop Nielsen have turned a slew of double plays this year. And the only thing better than one catcher, Concordia figures, is two: Lawhorn and Van Holten both see time behind home plate.HITTING: ½

The Eagles hang their hats on defense, and hope to do just enough offensively to win the game. Esser hits .312 in Concordia’s 3-hole while second baseman Goodman represents perhaps the best leadoff batter in the NAIA, his coach believes.SPEED:

Grahovac eschews stats, preferring to go “by feel.” So even if his players get thrown out stealing five times in a row, “we're still going to go,” he said.INTANGIBLES:

Ocassionally, Grahovac will wear his title ring to motivate his players, but only one current player listed on Concordia’s roster rubbed shoulders with members of the 2011 championship squad: first baseman Shine, who actually redshirted that year and didn’t make the trip to Lewiston.

added, noting the incredulous re-sponses he gets when teams have to face his closer.

“They go, ‘Wow, we’ve haven’t seen a guy like that in a long time.’ ”

While Land made the game-winning hit that downed the Stars, Grahovac pointed out that earlier in the Opening Round championship, the sophomore outfielder also made three game-saving catches — all of which proved just as important as his most memorable play.

Concordia’s other two outfielders, Mitchell Esser, who hits .491, and Robert Shiroky, who bats .476, round out the main offensive weapons for a team that — for the most part — sim-ply relies upon its defense to win.

The squad ranks No. 1 in the coun-try in total chances and redshirt sophomore Dillon Moran continues to improve with each opportunity he

gets to take the mound — striking out 12 during the Opening Round against Missouri Baptist and representing just one of five starters the Eagles can throw into the mix.

This was be Concordia’s final ap-pearance in the Series. The Eagles’ entire athletic department will move to the NCAA Division II ranks next school year.

ConCordiaContinued from PAge 19>

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By Theo Lawsonof the tribune

Not too long ago, the St. Thomas Bobcats were in way over their heads.

Almost akin to a hapless fourth-grader trying to keep up on the fifth-grade basket-ball court, the Bobcats, year after year, put themselves through the wringer, unaware that strength-of-schedule earns you few brownie points when it comes to the NAIA and its result-based rating system.

“We played pretty much a Division II schedule outside of the NAIA, outside of our con-ference schedule,” said Jorge Perez, the seventh-year coach of the private Catholic school located just outside Miami. Conveniently, or maybe not so much, St. Thomas is also a hop, skip and jump away from a handful of Floridian D-II powers.

Nova Southeastern, Florida Southern, University of Tam-pa ...

“We were playing these guys four or five times a year,” Perez said. “Each team. ... Re-ally, our schedule was mur-derer’s row.”

Since, the Bobcats have

eased up on scheduling games against their NCAA neighbors. Their record has boomed as a result.

St. Thomas, 44-16 and champions of the Lawrenceville (Ga.) Bracket, will open its first Avista NAIA World Series since 2007 at noon today against Concordia of California. The Bobcats took two of three from host Georgia Gwinnett after beating Westmont (Calif.) in the first game of the Opening Round tournament.

Perez’s program, which al-most joined the NCAA in 2009, hasn’t whittled out Division II opponents from its schedule completely.

“We started traveling around and playing some NAIA schools and things start-ed to get better,” he said. “In 2012, we won 45 games. ... It was a combination of schedul-ing a better schedule so we’re recognized nationally and also getting the right players in.”

In 2015, the Bobcats found the right dose.

They’ve jousted with Divi-sion II outfits such as Lynn University (Boca Raton) and Nova Southeastern (Fort Lau-derdale) — earning splits with each. And of course, they’ve found friendly NAIA compe-

tition within the borders of Florida.

“I feel now, the last two or three years, we have gotten to a point where we can beat those Division II schools and compete with them at a high level,” said Perez, who nearly made his Series breakthrough with St. Thomas in 2010, when the Bobcats were one out, and one pitch, shy of a plane trip to Lewiston, before Sun Confer-ence foe Embry-Riddle struck with a late double to come out with a 3-2 victory.

St. Thomas didn’t leave much in doubt this time, as the 20th-ranked Bobcats trounced No. 4 Georgia Gwin-nett 10-2 in game one, were rolled by the Grizzlies 10-3 in game two, then rebounded to win the finale 8-2 behind seven strong innings from ace Marcos Barrios.

And Barrios (9-2), one of 32 Floridians on Perez’s 38-man roster, will lead the Bobcats

out when St. Thomas takes the field this afternoon.

“This is a Latin kid who came in in January because he had to make up some credits and everything,” Perez said. “... He didn’t come in the best of shape and in January we start so fast, that it was a tran-sition. I don’t make excuses for anybody, but that kid, his first game, it was USC (Beau-fort) early in the season. It was 31 degrees. That kid had never pitched in any weather under 50 degrees.”

The Sandsharks roughed up Barrios for seven earned runs in three innings and came out on top 14-0.

Since, the righty has dropped just one decision and won nine.

Offensively, the Bobcats are led by Eric Santamaria, an infielder who bats .374 and has swatted 21 doubles. Ju-nior Jerry Downs is batting .348 and has a team-leading on-base percentage of .505.


St. ThomasLocation: Miami Gardens, fla.nickname: bobcatsCoach: Jorge Perez (seventh

year)season record: 44-16Rank in final NAIA poll: 20thHow qualified: Won Lawrenceville

bracketNumber of previous

appearances; best finish: four; third in 1996

> Juice (of five)sTaRTeRs: ½

Staff ace barrios (9-2) is the only starter with more than five wins under his belt. nine other bobcats have made starts this season — none of which appears as a clear-cut no. 2.RELIEvERS:

of the team’s 13 saves, rodriguez holds claim to 12 of those. That total ranks fifth among NAIA closers and first among freshmen. in 27 innings, rodriguez has 26 strikeouts and the bobcats are 20-3 when he appears.FIELDING:

St. thomas may prefer oppo-nents pepper its outfield, rather than its infield. The Bobcats have committed 88 errors — 83 of which were committed by players listed as infielders or pitchers.HITTING:

When men are on base, the Bobcats usually find a way to drive them in. three players have totaled at least 50 rbi, with three more sitting com-fortably in the 40-50 range.SPEED:

Without a single player cracking the nAiA top 200 stolen bases leaderboard, baserunning certainly isn’t St. thomas’ forte.INTANGIBLES: ½

No deficit is too big for St. thomas. the bobcats rallied from 11 down to beat South Carolina-beaufort 15-14, then erased an 8-0 seventh-inning deficit against Ave Maria to emerge with a 17-11 triumph later in the season.

s e e d s t . t h o m a s9

s t. t h o m a s s tat sBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVE. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SONico Hernandez .383 94 28 36 5 1 0 11 18 19Eric Santamaria .374 219 52 82 21 1 3 53 12 19Bryan Bermudez .360 150 44 54 6 0 1 19 24 17Steven Fischer .350 163 13 57 12 0 2 44 37 23Jerry Downs .348 207 67 72 17 2 7 51 43 34David Quintero .338 68 42 23 2 0 0 14 14 4Paul Chacin .335 206 43 69 12 1 5 69 35 35Oscar Rodriguez .329 167 36 55 13 0 1 25 19 33Cesar Ramirez .318 173 50 55 15 2 6 43 26 2Adam Duarte .298 141 36 42 4 0 2 19 11 30Brandon Canizares .294 136 32 40 8 0 1 26 18 28Elim Perritte .293 41 8 12 3 0 1 69 35 35Michael Centeno .288 191 49 55 9 1 7 47 31 58Totals .333 2029 519 676 131 8 40 463 306 359Opponents .270 1934 294 523 84 11 23 251 209 402


ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOAndrew Denis 2.01 3-0 22.1 21 7 5 8 16Tyeler Checkley 2.57 4-1 28.0 18 12 8 12 19Anthony Lopez 2.79 1-0 9.2 12 4 3 4 13Alex Hernandez 2.93 3-1 46.0 51 19 15 16 43Chris Rodriguez 3.00 2-0 27.0 22 11 9 11 26Marcos Barrios 3.63 9-2 96.2 92 41 39 27 78Alex Viera 3.69 4-1 31.2 35 19 13 13 30Alejandro Kan 4.31 5-0 31.1 34 17 15 8 20Ben Ancheff 4.40 3-2 14.1 19 9 7 3 7Kharlin Sued 4.69 3-2 40.1 37 24 21 20 41Brandon Valentin 5.11 1-3 24.2 24 18 14 14 27Alex Sarmiento 5.19 2-0 26.0 34 21 15 11 14Alex Perez 5.20 1-2 36.1 43 28 21 20 25Devon Stubbings 6.60 2-0 15.0 17 12 11 15 12Andres Hernandez 7.24 1-1 32.1 42 34 26 18 18Totals 4.26 44-16 499.0 523 294 236 209 403Opponents 8.10 16-44 483.1 673 518 435 306 361

Saves (13) — Chris Rodriguez 12, Alex Sarmiento.

Easier regular season path leads Bobcats to Series

St. Thomas UniversityJerry Downs and his teammates celebrate following Downs’ grand slam home run vs. Webber earlier in the season. Downs has cracked seven round-trippers this season, tops on the team, as well as driven in 51 runs.


S E E D V A N G U A R D10 VanguardLocation: Costa Mesa, Calif.

Nickname: Lions

Coach: Rob Pegg (third year)

Season record: 38-20

Rank in fi nal NAIA poll: Unranked

How qualifi ed: Won Santa Clarita Bracket

Number of previous appearances; best fi nish: one; fourth in 1985

> Juice (of fi ve)STARTERS: ½

Vanguard’s three-man rota-tion, consisting of Isaac, a righty, and southpaws Moak and Torrey, has combined to go 20-10 on the season with an ERA of 3.01. The Lions are usually within striking distance when those three can go seven or more innings.RELIEVERS: ½

The rest of Vanguard’s staff has, more or less, used the postseason as a rest period. Pegg’s relievers were needed for just 4� innings during the Lions’ Opening Round tournament. The unit didn’t concede a single run during that span, though.

FIELDING: Most of Vanguard’s errors are

committed on the corners, by Stone (12) at fi rst and McKnight (12) at third.HITTING: ½

Batting .285 as a team, the Lions are one of two Series qualifi ers hitting under .300. The Lions are plating just 5.5 runs per game, which ranks last among teams competing in Lewiston.SPEED: ½

Sandoval has swiped 36 bases and has been caught only six times. The Lions are successful on 82 percent of their stolen-base attempts, making up for their lack of offensive prowess.INTANGIBLES: ½

The tournament’s No. 10 seed dropped six of its fi nal seven regular-season/GSAC tournament games after winning 12 of 13 in late March/early April. Thankfully for them, the Lions have been streaky good as of late, winning four straight to earn their fi rst Series berth of the new millen-nium.

By THEO LAWSONOF THE TRIBUNE

For a club that’s endured plenty of dry years, playing in a state currently battling a drought of its own, the Van-guard Lions sure know a lot about taking things by storm.

Owners of this year’s No. 10 seed, the Lions, who haven’t visited Lewiston — or any Series site for that matter — in 30 years, will have one more opportunity this season to buck the odds.

Making its second-ever NAIA World Series appear-ance and its first since 1985, Vanguard will open with No. 7 Lindsey Wilson at 9 this morn-ing at Harris Field.

The program from Costa

Mesa, Calif., may be this tour-nament’s biggest surprise. Which means the Lions are also the most likely to exit first.

Vanguard never cracked the NAIA’s regular-season Top 25 rankings and was one of the last teams admitted to the 45-team Opening Round tournament.

Browse through the first few pages of the NAIA’s national hitting lead-erboard — each of which lists 20 teams — and you won’t find the Lions.

They’re nestled into a five-way tie for 89th place, on the fifth page, with a team batting average of .285.

But with all that considered, coach Rob Pegg, already an ad-mirer of the scenery the Lew-

iston-Clarkston Valley has to offer — “We’ve got guys who have nev-er seen rivers this big,” he claims — is banking on an extended stay.

“It’s kind of a no-lose situation, because it’s like, ‘Hey, you know what; we’re the team everyone’s expected to beat, so the pressure’s

on them,’ ” Pegg said. “... We’ll come in as the 10 seed but that doesn’t matter. We believe if we play our best, we can take anyone or compete with any-one, so that’s the mood.”

And this time of year, hot streaks seem to mean more

Longshot Lions not backing down from Series challenge

Rob Pegg

than lofty rankings.After all, six of the nation’s

top 10 teams failed to make the World Series cut and 11 of the teams ranked between 11 and 25 saw their seasons end in the Opening Round.

Vanguard, on the other

hand, enters today’s contest on a four-game roll after los-ing six of its final seven games in the regular season and in the Golden State Athletic Con-ference tournament.

“What I looked at kind of during our up-and-down

moments, it’s not like we were losing by much,” Pegg said. Indeed, just three of Vanguard’s 20 losses were decided by more than five runs. “... The teams we lost to in those streaks were Opening Round qualifiers and part of it was just learning who you are as a team.”

The Lions have a better sense of their own identity now.

A disciplined team on de-fense, with a pitching staff that should keep up with the Series field, Vanguard rarely allows opponents to go on scoring sprees. This season, the Li-ons’ opposition has been held to just four runs per game and only on three occasions have opponents hung double digits on them.

Pegg’s staff has compiled a season ERA of 3.37 and during the Opening Round, Vanguard pitchers gave up just seven earned runs in four games.

“We didn’t even use some key guys because our other guys did a great job,” said Pegg, a Vanguard alum who caught for the Lions in 1995-97.

Offensive potency, how-ever, has proven to be an Achilles’ heel for the Lions this year, though they should be encouraged by their output during their last three games — each of which saw Van-guard tally eight runs.

Generally speaking, signs of encouragement haven’t been hard to come by, even

for the tournament’s most overwhelming underdog.

“We were mindful of the guys in ’85 who did it,” Pegg said. “A lot of those guys still are contributing alumni, and come back and talk to the guys. ... None of our guys were even born the last time it happened.

“It’s a great blessing for sure.”


VA N G U A R D S TAT SBATTING

Minimum 30 at-bats AVE. AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SOJustin Vega .333 123 23 41 2 1 0 14 20 16Jose Rojas .333 225 40 75 15 2 12 57 20 11Paul Keating .330 221 43 73 9 5 3 30 12 6Brock Eissman .309 204 34 63 13 2 8 39 5 31Brandon Sandoval .291 223 50 65 12 0 1 27 24 35Brett Collins .282 209 27 59 7 0 4 33 13 19Justin Davis .273 88 30 24 3 0 1 9 7 18Taylor McKnight .260 181 18 47 10 0 3 26 9 9David Stone .257 187 34 48 14 0 4 28 27 33Kevin Bettencourt .216 97 2 21 3 0 0 14 10 16Michael Flores .200 45 6 9 1 0 3 10 11 16Cole Mcmath .154 39 0 6 0 0 0 4 6 13Totals .285 1892 322 539 91 10 39 292 168 277Opponents .248 1838 234 456 72 9 17 204 187 330


ERA W-L IP H R ER BB SOChristian Sheehan 1.00 1-0 9.0 6 1 1 7 8Michael Ostrea 1.64 2-0 11.0 8 4 2 5 5Sam Frakes 2.38 0-2 22.2 21 7 6 10 17Ryan Heinle 2.68 4-2 53.2 45 20 16 12 32Sean Isaac 2.91 9-5 102.0 85 46 33 39 92Scott Torrey 3.07 6-1 102.2 102 48 35 25 65Jordan Moak 3.18 5-4 65.0 60 28 23 33 31Roberto Johnson 3.96 0-1 25.0 28 11 11 4 5Marshall McKinnon 4.83 5-2 41.0 43 27 22 11 25Michael Jordan 5.63 2-2 24.0 24 18 15 11 23Shaniel Rivera 5.79 3-0 28.0 29 20 18 15 22Matt Silberman 5.79 0-0 4.2 2 3 3 10 2Totals 3.39 38-19 494.1 457 234 186 187 330Opponents 5.02 20-38 484.0 539 322 270 168 277

Saves (14) — Sam Frakes 6, Marshall McKinnon 5, Michael Jordan 3.

Vanguard UniversityAt last week’s qualifying tournament, Vanguard shortstop Jose Rojas went 8-for-16 with two home runs and seven RBI.

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