ABILENE – The Abilene Christian baseball team returns to Crutcher Scott Field this weekend for a four-game Lone Star Conference series vs. Cameron. Game times are Friday at 7 p.m., Saturday at 2 p.m. (DH) and Sunday at 1 p.m.
The Wildcats begin the week at 22-15 and 10-6 vs. the conference, 2.0 games behind first-place Tarleton State, which will play at Angelo State this weekend. The Aggies, meanwhile, are 10-22 overall and in last place at 4-12, 3.0 games behind sixth-place Incarnate Word.
ACU lost its first conference series last weekend in Canyon, where it dropped 3 of 4 games to West Texas A&M. The Wildcats received a pair of quality starts Saturday from seniors
Carter Hahn and
Aaron Lambrix, but could never quite get its offense rolling against the Buffaloes, who currently boast the league's second-best team ERA at 3.31.
Junior third baseman
Kyle Giusti, who homered in his first at-bat vs. WT, went on to lead the Wildcats in hitting with a .429 average (6-14). He also produced four of the team's nine runs with two RBI and two runs scored.
Giusti's performance pushed him into the league's top-15 batting leaders with a .360 average and his 32 RBI are tied for third most in the LSC with ASU's Andrew LaCombe.
Elsewhere at the plate,
Chuck Duarte drove in three runs on four hits and a sacrifice fly, while
Kyle Conwell went 4-for-14 and reached base in all four games to extend his streak to 13.
On the mound, Hahn delivered his third complete game over the past four weeks as he blanked WT during the first game of Saturday's doubleheader on five hits over 7.0 innings. He also recorded a career-high 10 strikeouts in improving to 6-2 on the season. Hahn's previous high of nine strikeouts was registered earlier this season during a 4.0 inning relief appearance at McMurry on Feb. 17.
Additionally, Hahn's shutout was his second of the season as he previously shared one with
Brady Rodriguez on Feb. 23 in a 5-0 win vs. New Mexico Highlands.
Hahn leads the LSC with 66 Ks through 61.0 innings of work and his six wins are second only to Kingsville's Dallas Ponder (7-0).
In Saturday's nightcap, Lambrix lost a pitching duel to WT's Paul Pulley, who allowed just three hits through 6.2 innings and 70 pitches. Lambrix had one bad inning, in which he gave up all three runs on five hits, but kept his team in the game by escaping a two-on, no-out jam in the fourth, and inducing a 4-6-3 double play to end a threat in the fifth.
Cameron comes to Abilene following a four-game series split with Texas A&M-Kingsville in Lawton, Okla. The Aggies won the first two games of the series by scores of 5-4 and 7-2, but were later defeated 7-4 on Saturday and 15-2 on Sunday as the Javelinas ripped 23 hits.
Cameron ranks at or near the bottom of the LSC's three team statistical categories with a .267 batting average, 6.71 ERA and .951 fielding percentage.
Nick Smith is the Aggies top hitter with a .356 batting average, while Kenny Acosta leads his team with four home runs.
Aaron Kleekamp, who has been used as both a starter and reliever, has one of the league's lowest opponents' batting average at .209. He is also 3-3 on the year with a 3.63 ERA, three complete games and two saves.
ACU beat Cameron, 8-2, earlier this year at the Whitten Inn Classic on March 2 to extend its lead in the all-time series to 44-31. Against the Aggies that night, Hahn held them to one run on five hits with five strikeouts, while
Seth Spivey and
Tyler Eager went a combined 6-for-9 with three extra-base hits, five RBI and three runs.
