ABILENE – Abilene Christian baseball looks to bounce back from a tough weekend at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi with a fresh series starting Friday night at Southeastern Louisiana's PKD at Alumni Field. Start times are 6 p.m. Friday, 2 p.m. Saturday and 1 p.m. Sunday. All three games have links to real-time stats, live video and audio.
This is only the third series between the Wildcats and Lions as the two sides haven't met since 2016. ACU won one of three games during its last trip to Hammond, La. in 2015, and were swept at home the following spring.
ACU (10-10, 3-3 Southland) had its overall and Southland Conference records drop to .500 this past weekend after losing two of three games at Corpus Chirsti's Chapman Field. The series got off to a great start with junior
Spencer Chirpich coming one strike away from posting a complete-game shutout in the Wildcats' 4-1 win, but the Islanders rallied in game two's 7-3 victory and held back ACU in the finale Sunday night, 6-5.
The Wildcats and Islanders were forced to play a twice-delayed doubleheader Sunday due to the effects of rain at Chapman Field.
ACU hit .260 as a team vs. Texas A&M-Corpus Christi with 12 runs and five extra-base hits including a home run by
Riley Donahue, which was his second of the year.
Koby Claborn was nominated for Southland Conference Player of the Week after hitting .583 (7-12) with a double and RBI, and
Dalon Farkas' lone two-bagger of the weekend was the 48th of his career, tying
Russell Crippen for first in the Wildcats' records books.
Luis Trevino again hit well over .300 in a weekend series, going 4-for-12 with a double and team high three runs scored.
For his efforts on the mound, Chirpich received an honorable mention from the Southland Conference for Pitcher of the Week. He is now 3-1 on the season with a 2.60 ERA and has 29K in 27.2 innings pitched.
The Lions come into this weekend with overall and Southland records of 7-12 and 1-2 with their lone conference series taking place March 8-9 at home vs. Central Arkansas. Afterward they lost two of three in Stillwater vs. Oklahoma State. They will play host to Alcorn State Wednesday March 20 before welcoming the Wildcats.
Southeastern La. is batting .232 as a team led by Kyle Scimpf's .319 average and .417 slugging percentage. The pitching staff currently owns a 5.14 ERA and has struck out 152 batters in 170 innings pitched. Corey Gaconi is their strikeout leader with 33 punchouts.
