Bowling Green State University Athletics
Falcons Host Michigan State In Home Opener Tuesday
March 16, 2009 | Baseball
March 16, 2009
BOWLING GREEN, OHIO -
This Week
Tues., March 17
Michigan State (2-13) at Bowling Green
Steller Field - 3 p.m.
Wed., March 18 (CANCELLED)
Bowling Green at Cleveland State (3-9)
Pipe Yard Stadium - 3 p.m.
Fri. - Sun., March 20-22
Western Michigan (3-12) at Bowling Green
Steller Field - Friday (3 p.m.); Saturday/Sunday (1 p.m.)
FALCONS BEGIN HOME SEASON AND MAC SCHEDULE
The Bowling Green State University baseball team, coming off a 5-3 record on their spring trip to Winter Haven, Fla., returns to begin the home portion of their 2009 schedule with a game against Big Ten foe Michigan State on Tuesday. The Falcons will be on the road Wednesday for a single game at Cleveland State before returning home to begin defense of their Mid-American Conference overall and East Division titles hosting Western Michigan, the preseason West Division favorite, for a three-game weekend series.
SERIES INFORMATION
BG has a 3-6 record against Michigan State...the last meeting was in 2007 when BG lost a 5-3 decision at home...the two programs have split the four series games played at Bowling Green...BG leads the series with Cleveland State, 39-16...BG has won the last 11 meetings in the series with the last Viking victory an 8-1 decision in 1997...Western Michigan has a 71-54 edge in the series with Bowling Green...the series last season at WMU was snowed out...WMU took two of three from the Falcons in the 2007 season...in the last series played in Bowling Green, BG swept a three-game series from the Broncos in the 2006 season.
SPRING TRIP REVIEW
The Falcons posted a 5-3 record on their spring trip to Winter Haven, Fla. BG started with a pair of wins over Fairfield (11-3) and Eastern Kentucky (8-4) before losing back-to-back games to Bucknell (10-7) and Connecticut (21-6). BG then won three of their last four to complete the trip with a winning record. The Falcons got consecutive strong starts in posting wins over Sacred Heart (1-0) and Northern Iowa (3-0). On the final day of their trip, they lost a 15-7 decision to Indiana before scoring a run in the bottom of the 10th inning to earn an 11-10 win over Bradley.
BATS COME ALIVE
Expected to be the strength of the team, Bowling Green started the spring trip having hit only .259 as a team in the first six games of the season and had averaged just 4.5 runs per game. But, the warm weather got the Falcon offense in high gear as they hit .339 in the eight games and scored 54 runs (6.8 per game). BG had a team slugging percentage of .435 with 23 extra-base hits (19 doubles, three triples, one home run) in the eight contests while they had a team on-base percentage of .390.
SPENCER OFF TO BIG START
Junior third baseman Derek Spencer led the team with a .452 (14-of-31) average in Florida. In addition, the first-team All-MAC selection last season drove in 13 runs and scored nine. He had a .613 slugging percentage for the week and a .514 on-base percentage. He hit safely in seven of the eight games (he did not have a hit in the Indiana contest) and had four RBI in the Bradley game and three RBI in the Fairfield and Eastern Kentucky contests. For the season, Spencer is hitting .373 with 17 RBI and 12 runs scored.
SMITH, MALEWITZ EMERGE
With last year's #1 starter Frank Berry II sidelined with an injury, the Falcons have been looking for someone on the pitching staff to step forward and earn that role. They may have found two players while in Florida. Sophomores Brennan Smith and Matt Malewitz both had two strong starts on the trip. Smith did not give up an earned run in 13.0 innings of work and Malewitz had a 1.84 ERA in 14.2 innings. Smith won both of his starts, against Fairfield and Sacred Heart, while Malewitz had a complete game win over Northern Iowa and a no-decision after going 5.2 innings in the Eastern Kentucky game. Smith pitched five innings with six strikeouts in the Fairfield game and came back with eight innings of one-hit pitching against Sacred Heart. He had a career-high 10 strikeouts in the Sacred Heart contest and faced only one batter over the minimum. Malewitz followed Smith's performance with even a better one, a complete game one-hitter facing the minimum 27 batters.
MORE OFFENSIVE NUMBERS
In addition to Spencer, a number of Falcon players enjoyed the warm weather and used that to get their bats going. Junior Tyler Elkins, who missed all of last season with an injury after transferring from John Logan CC, hit .433 (13-of-30) on the trip with six doubles, three RBI and seven runs scored. Elkins has a nine-game hitting streak going and he has hit safely in 10 of the 12 games he has played in this season. Junior T.J. Blanton hit .423 (11-of-26) with six runs scored and four RBI. He had three doubles and a triple starting all eight games. Senior Brian Hangbers saw a career-best eight game hitting streak come to an end when he went hitless in the final game of the trip against Bradley, but he hit .419 (13-of-31) on the trip with four runs scored. Senior Ryan Shay hit .333 (11-of-33) with 10 runs scored and six RBI. Juniors Logan Meisler (nine-of-27) and Mark Galvin (eight-of-24) also hit .333 in Florida. Meisler had seven RBI and Galvin had six. Freshman Patrick Martin played in four games in Florida, making three starts, and hit .429 (six-of-14) with four runs scored.
BG BLOOP SINGLES
The back-to-back shutouts on the spring trip were the first since the spring trip in 2007 when BG shutout Georgetown (5-0) and IPFW (11-0) in consecutive games.
NEXT WEEK
The Falcons have mid-week games with Findlay (March 24) and Cleveland State (March 25) at home before embarking on their first MAC road trip, a threegame series against Northern Illinois (March 27-29).
