HARROGATE, Tenn. – The Lincoln Memorial University baseball team will conclude its regular season with a four-game homestand beginning Wednesday afternoon against King (24-16). The Railsplitters (27-18) won a wild series at Catawba over the weekend—the program's first-ever series win in Salisbury, N.C.— in which the team went deep 14 times over the three-game set. The Tornado were swept at Mount Olive over the weekend to conclude Conference Carolinas play at 10-12.
Lincoln Memorial defeated King for a fourth straight time with a 13-3 win at Bristol on February 20.
Logan Augustine went 2-for-3 with three runs scored and a pair of walks and RBI.
Timmy Wages finished 3-for-5 with three RBI and a run scored.
Muta Crusoe also had two hits and reached another time on a walk.
Schedule/Game Day Links:
Wednesday, April 18 (4 p.m.) -
Live Stats
Quick Hits:
- The Railsplitters were powered by three home runs and
Ethan Elliott's complete game in Friday's 6-3 series-opening win at Catawba.
Seth Hunt hit his first career home run, and
Timmy Wages and
Chris Salvey also went deep. Elliott allowed three earned runs and struck out 11 Indians over 9.0 innings to improve to 6-3.
- Sparked by a pair of Hunt home runs, the Railsplitters scored three runs to tie the game at 6-6 in the ninth and added three more in the 10
thto eventually beat the Indians 9-8 in extra innings in game one of Saturday's doubleheader. Hunt finished the game 4-for-6 with a two-run homer in the ninth and three-run shot the following inning to record a career-high five RBI.
Will Reddick and Salvey each had two hits and homered.
- Lincoln Memorial tied a program record with seven home runs and made another three-run comeback in the final frame of game two, but the Indians walked off the Railsplitters in the bottom of the seventh on an RBI double to salvage a game in the series. Catawba out hit the Railsplitters 15-13. Ten of each team's hits went for extra bases. Reddick and Salvey each homered twice while
Tyler Adams, Crusoe and
Mason Ewers also went deep.
- The series win evened LMU's record at 12-12 in SAC play and moved the team into a three-way tie for fifth place.
- Lincoln Memorial ranks second nationally with 376 runs scored and 489 hits. The team has also walked the third-most times with 214.
- Salvey is tied for fourth with eight home runs in SAC play and has 11 overall. Wages has gone deep nine times while Adams has hit seven. LMU's 53 round-trippers rank fourth in the SAC.
- The Railsplitters are 19-8 at home with an 8-4 mark in SAC play and have won all four home conference series. LMU is 8-10 on the road and 4-8 in SAC games after winning its first SAC road series of the year at Catawba.
- The Railsplitters as a team have hit .343 at home compared to .286 on the road. On-base percentage (.439-.384) and slugging percentage (.537-.449) are also significantly higher at Lamar Hennon Field.
- LMU has recorded a double-digit hit total in 26 of 45 games, including 15 of 26 at home. The team is batting .319 overall—second in the SAC to only Catawba's .320. Lincoln Memorial's .313 mark in SAC play ranks behind Catawba (.348) and Newberry (.330) and Tusculum (.317).
- LMU pitching has a 5.20 ERA overall with a 5.30 mark in SAC play. Both rank fourth in the conference. Pitchers have a collective 4.78 ERA at home and 5.83 on the road.
- LMU has an 8.97 ERA in 11 April games. The team posted solid ERAs of 4.20 in February and 3.87 in March.
- Railsplitter starting pitchers have accumulated a 17-8 record with a 4.49 ERA in 45 games and have struck out 226 batters in 220.1 innings. Relievers have collectively posted a 6.25 ERA.
- Elliott leads all SAC starting pitchers with a 2.61 ERA, 96 strikeouts and 76.0 innings pitched and is tied with
Joe Bobiak for second in the league with six wins. The lefty has posted a double-digit strikeout total six times in 11 starts.
Notes on King:
- The Tornado used a Kevin Barbato three-run homer in the eighth to tie the score at 4-4 in Friday's series opener at Mount Olive and took the lead in the 11
th, but the Trojans walked off to a 6-5 victory.
- King was held to one hit in a 3-0 shutout in game one of Saturday's doubleheader. JP Castaneda broke up the no-no with a single to lead off the sixth inning.
- King fell 8-7 in the nightcap. Tyler Bailey and Bubba Ruiz each went 3-for-5, and Castaneda went 2-for-5 with three RBI. Mount Olive broke a 4-4 tie with three runs in the seventh and one more in the eighth. The Tornado made it in interesting by plating three in the ninth and had the tying run in scoring position, but a lineout to third ended the game.
- King is scheduled to play at UVA-Wise at 4 p.m. on Tuesday.
- The Tornado have clinched a winning record for the first time since 2013. One more win would also mark the most since that campaign's 31.
- King's 257 runs rank eighth in the nine-team Conference Carolinas. The team ranks last in hits but is sixth with a .290 average. The only offensive category the Tornado rank in the upper half of the conference in is stolen bases—the team's 54 are fourth, though its 21 times caught stealing are the conference's highest total.
- Tyler Bailey has reached base in 24 straight games and leads the team with a .333 average.
- Castaneda is on a 12-game hitting streak and leads the Tornado in hits (47) and stolen bases (13).
- Pitching has been King's strong suit, as the team's 4.38 ERA is third in Conference Carolinas.
- King is just 6-11 on the road and has lost eight of its past nine. The Tornado are 18-5 at home.
-King has fared well against South Atlantic Conference opponents with an 8-4 record with season sweeps of in-state rivals Carson-Newman and Tusculum.
Series History:
- LMU is 27-20-1 all-time against the Tornado, including a 19-9 mark in Harrogate.
- The Railsplitters won 15-0 in last year's meeting in Harrogate.
- Lincoln Memorial has won five of the last seven meetings with King and four straight. The winning team has scored at least 10 runs in each of the last six contests.
