 After dropping a neutral site contest in Kokomo on Tuesday, the University of Evansville baseball team will be hoping to get back on track on Thursday as the team starts off a three-game series with Eastern Kentucky in Richmond, Ky.
The Aces (9-10) will be looking to rebound from a 6-3 loss to Kent State on Tuesday, and the team will head to Richmond looking for a first road series victory this season.
While UE’s high-power line-up has been key in a number of the team’s nine victories this season, head coach Wes Carroll is hoping to see his weekend pitching rotation continue to improve, and the duo of Connor Strain and Patrick Schnieders will get starting nods this weekend after impressing in recent outings.
Schnieders, who will take the mound on Thursday, owns one of the more eye-opening starts over the past two seasons after he registered 10 strikeouts in the Aces’ shutout win over Central Connecticut earlier this month. He’s posted a 1-1 record over his first four starts of the year, and he’ll enter the series with a 2.66 earned run average over 23.2 innings of work. Strain, meanwhile, will be making just his fourth start of the season after overcoming an early injury, and the senior right-hander is also 1-1 on the year with a 1.35 ERA over 13.1 frames.
In the line-up, Trey Hair has been the gold standard for UE this season. The junior transfer out of Firth, Neb., is batting .410 with 10 doubles and three homers over the first 19 games of the season. Eric McKibban is second on the team with a .375 mark, and he leads the team in runs scored with 20. Boomer Synek rounds out the top three for the Aces with a .307 average and a team-best 21 runs batted in.
Overall, the Aces are hitting .286 this season, with 20 home runs, which is just one shy of the team’s season total from a year ago
EKU, on the other hand, is 10-11 this season and enters the weekend on the heels of three straight losses to Belmont and Marshall.
First pitch from Turkey Hughes Field on Thursday is slated for 4 p.m. Eastern.
