March 13, 2008

Weekly Release: At Missouri State

Games 14-16: Northern Colorado (5-8) at Missouri State (8-4)

Looking To Snap
After winning five of its first eight games, Northern Colorado has hit a bump in the road dropping its last five contests, including losing all four in a series at Nebraska. The Bears look to snap the streak against the Missouri State Bears with a three-game series beginning on Friday. MSU is 8-4 on the season and has lost its last two to Big XII teams in Kansas (11-7) and Oklahoma State (19-10).

Series History
This is the first time the two Bears teams have ever met on the diamond. Missouri State opened the season against Dallas Baptist and had a game against Kansas last week, two teams NC plays later this year, but the teams have not faced any common opponents thus far.

Road Warriors
Northern Colorado is getting used to living on the road as the Bears start the 2008 season with 24 straight games away from home. The Bears do not play at Jackson Field until March 28 when they host South Dakota State for a three-game series. The 2007 team also started with its first 24 on the road, posting a 7-17 record to start the year. The 24 games is the longest road stretch to open a season in school history.

Special K's
Starting pitcher T.R. Keating has walked just one batter in 17.2 innings pitched and he leads the team with 16 strikeouts. Senior Jon Klausing leads the team with a 2.00 ERA with four earned runs in 18.0 innings of work. He also has 15 strikeouts.

The Every Day Player
Senior short stop Cory Morales is the only player on the Bears roster to have started and played in all 13 games this season. Morales has 27 putouts and 41 assists in the first 13 games. Last season, Morales in his first season with the Bears played an started in all 51 games, bringing his career total to 64 consecutive games started.

Driving Them Home
Junior first baseman Kevin Sandberg leads the team with 10 RBI in 11 games played. He also had the most extra base hits with five, two doubles and three home runs and is hitting .244. Last season, Sandberg tallied 17 extra base hits with seven doubles, one triple and nine home runs - the second highest long ball total on the club. Sandberg currently has the longest active hitting streak on the team with seven straight games.

Playing With The Order
Head Coach Kevin Smallcomb is still playing quite a bit with the team's batting order. Most players have hit in at least three different places in the lineup, with junior Erik Hegstad hitting in five spots. Senior Andy Mees has been the most consistent, starting 10 games batting cleanup.

It's Been A While
Northern Colorado was shut out in the finale against Nebraska. It marked the first time since March 24, 2007 the Bears were blanked on the scoreboard, a stretch of 45 games. The last shutout came against Arizona, the current number two team in the nation.

It's Been A While
Senior Chad Murray, who is in his second season with the Bears, took the hill for the first time in his career at NC in the first game at Southeast Missouri State, closing out the game and earning a save. Murray also earned a save in the second game of the series, facing the minimum six batters, striking out one. Murray appeared in 43 of the team's 51 games last season starting 19 at third base, 14 as the designated hitter and three at first base but did not pitch.

Strength of Schedule
The Bears will face some of the best teams in the nation in 2008. Six of the team's opponents played in the NCAA Regionals last year with UC Irvine and Arizona State advancing to the College World Series (Texas A&M, Nebraska, Creighton, Arkansas). Four of those teams (#1 Arizona State , #10 UC Irvine, #19 Arkansas, #22 Texas A&M) are currently ranked among the top 25 in the USA Today/ESPN Coaches poll.

Total Team Effort
Of the 10 players who have played in at least 10 of the 13 games thus far, all 10 have at least two RBI. Junior first baseman Kevin Sandberg leads the team with 10 RBI, while three other players on the team have five RBI each in seniors Jeff Horn, Cory Morales and Chad Murray.

Getting A Chance
Brennan Garr, who pitched for the Bears from 2004-06, has thrown to one batter during spring training thus far, doing his job and getting BJ Upton of the Arizona Diamondbacks to groundout to end the third inning.

The Long And Short Of It
The first game of the series against Southeast Missouri State lasted 2 hours and 27 minutes, while the slugfest in the finale took almost double that, lasting 4 hours and 25 minutes. Both were nine inning games. The shortest game of the year in a full nine-inning contest is 2:15 in the finale against Nebraska.