ABILENE – Abilene Christian baseball begins its 2019 Southland Conference schedule Friday for the start of a three-game home series vs. Northwestern State. The Demons are off to a 6-4 start and are the league's defending tournament champions.
Friday's and Sunday's games will be web streamed on
ACUSports.com and broadcast locally on
98.1 FM – The Ticket. Saturday's game, however, will be an
internet-only broadcast due to conflicts with the women's and men's basketball doubleheader.
Northwestern State finished 38-24 overall last season and went 18-12 vs. the league before winning all four of its games in Sugar Land, Texas against four different opponents. The Demons edged McNeese, 2-1, in the first round, topped Southeastern La., 5-1, in the quarterfinals, eliminated Nicholls in the semifinal round, 3-2, and beat New Orleans for the NCAA Regional bid, 7-5.
NSU was sent all the way to Oregon State for the NCAA Corvallis Region, where the Demons picked up a 9-0 win over San Diego State in between losses to the host Beavers (9-3) and their neighbors from LSU (9-5).
This year's Demons are batting .259 with 63 runs through their first 10 games and so far have earned wins over Houston, Southern, ULM, Little Rock and Louisiana Tech. Their pitching has been even better complete with a 3.18 earned-run average and recent back-to-back shutouts of ULM and Little Rock.
Jerry Maddox has struck out a team-high 20 batters through three starts and 14.2 innings pitched, and teammate Ridge Heisler is right behind him with 18K.
Heisler and Maddox are the projected Friday and Saturday starters, while right-hander Nathan Jones has been listed as Sunday's probable starter.
ACU's projected rotation is
Spencer Chirpich,
Derek Scott and Jon Nicholson. This trio has started the last three weekend series vs. Hartford, Pine Bluff and Hartford and have a combined 44 strikeouts in 44.1 innings pitched.
The Wildcats (7-6) are batting .259 as a team following Wednesday night's 9-3 loss at No. 20 Texas A&M with four everyday .300 + hitters:
Luis Trevino (.388, 3 HR, 12 RBI), Scott (.333, 5 doubles, 2 HR),
Dalon Farkas (.327, 7 doubles, 12 RBI) and
Ryne Randle (.320, 10 R, seven RBI).
