FIRST PITCH
The Arkansas Tech baseball team is back in Great American Conference action this weekend and are at home to face Arkansas-Monticello.
The game is slated to begin at 2 p.m. on Tuesday afternoon.
The Wonder Boys and Choctaws have met seven times historically in a series that dates back to 1996. In terms of the all-time series record, Tech holds a 4-3 lead over Mississippi College.
The two teams met twice last season with a home-and-home mid-week series. The Wonder Boys won the first game, 12-5 on the road in early March and then losing 7-3 at home in early April.
TECH(NICALLY) SPEAKING
The Wonder Boys enter this mid-week game at Mississippi College with an overall record of 22-13. This past weekend, the Wonder Boys won their series at home against Arkansas-Monticello as they bounced back from a one-run loss in game one to win the next two games.
Entering play against Mississippi College, the Wonder Boys are hitting .272 as a team (297-for-1,092) with 215 runs scored, 64 doubles, seven triples and 27 home runs.
Logan Schwenke currently leads the team in batting average at .337 (34-for-101). Schwenke has also been the top-power production bat in the lineup as he leads the team in slugging percentage at .683 thanks to eight doubles, three triples and seven home runs. His home run total leads the team, and he is also the team-leader in runs scored with 29. Nine other Wonder Boys have driven in at least 10 runs and three others have at least 20 driven in.
Keaton Ranallo is second on the team in home runs at five and leads the team in RBIs with 32. Markos Cabranes is next in homers with four while Christian Olea and Brendyn Bard have three and Grant Jones has two. Cole Dawson, Nick Jones and Sawyer Duddleston account for the other homers thus far with one apiece.
In terms of other extra-base hits, Olea and Ranallo are tied for the team-lead in doubles with nine while the triples are led by Schwenke with three.
On the mound, the Wonder Boys have a team ERA of 4.16 and have struck out 305 batters in 292.1 innings of work.
John Gray, Emilano Mata, and Jack Rector made starts this past weekend against Southwestern Oklahoma and likely won't see action at Mississippi College. A candidate to start one of the mid-week games is Mason Willis. He already has three mid-week starts to his credit and has appeared in 10 games overall. Willis is 2-1 with a 4.91 ERA and 19 strikeouts in 25.2 innings of work.
Aside from those that have made starts, 12 other pitchers have taken the mound for the Wonder Boys in relief roles. Will Horton has the most relief appearances thus far with 17. He is 3-1 with two saves and has a 1.82 ERA with 25 strikeouts in 24.2 innings. Grant Shahan has logged the most innings amongst prominent relievers with 35.1 to his credit. Shahan is second on the team in strikeouts with 43.
Leading the Wonder Boys once more is Dave Dawson. The all-time winningest coach in Tech Baseball history, Dawson enters his 15th year in the dugout for the Wonder Boys. In his previous 14 seasons, Dawson has guided amassed a 414-298 record. He has also had seven seasons with 30 or more wins which includes the 2014 season in which he led the team a program-record 44 wins and hosting rights for that year's Central Region Tournament.
Overall, Dawson is in his 19th year as a head baseball coach at the collegiate level as he spent four years as head coach at Kansas Wesleyan and totaled 118 wins. His combined win total at Tech and Kansas Wesleyan have him with a career record of 552-395.
SCOUTING MISSISSIPPI COLLEGE
Mississippi College enters this mid-week game with Tech with a 14-17 overall record and a 12-6 mark in GAC play. This past weekend, the Choctaws lost their series on the road at West Alabama. MC would win the middle game of the series, 9-4, but lost the opener, 3-2 and the finale 6-1.
Offensively, the Choctaws are hitting .286 as a team (278-for-972) with 205 runs scored, 50 doubles, five triples and 44 home runs.
Wesley Sides currently leads the team in batting average at .344 (33-for-96). JT Vance has provided the most power production thus far with a .706 slugging percentage thanks to six doubles, one triple and 12 home runs. Two other players have hit at least eight home runs with Caleb Reese being second with 10 and Sides third with eight. Reese leads the team in RBIs with 35. Three others have at least 20 RBIs.
On the mound, the Choctaws have a 6.37 team ERA and have struck out 182 batters in 253.0 innings of work.
Last weekend, the Choctaws used a weekend rotation of Holland Townes, Jeff Liddell and Cooper Gadman against West Alabama and likely won't see action against Tech.
In their most-recent mid-week game against Henderson State, Mississippi College started CJ Lofton, but he only pitched one inning. Lofton is currently 1-3 with a 6.69 ERA and 22 strikeouts in 35.0 innings.
In addition to those starters, the Choctaws have used 12 other pitchers in relief roles. Kyle Collett has made the most relief appearances with 14. Collett is 3-0 with a 6.29 ERA with 14 strikeouts in 24.0 innings.
The Choctaws are led by Jeremy Haworth, who is in his ninth season as head coach at Mississippi College and his 13th overall. In his time at MC, Haworth is 172-205 and 274-300-1 overall.
