Weekend Preview: UCSB, Long Beach Look To Carry Momentum Into Big West Play

Coming into the season, the Big West Conference looked to have both impressive depth and elite teams, with three teams ranked in the Preseason Top 25. As the Big West moves into conference play this weekend, however, the league looks more tightly compact in the middle and only Cal State Fullerton remains in the rankings at No. 10.

Just two Big West teams are more than five games above .500 (Fullerton at 15-9 and Hawaii at 15-8) and just two rank in the top 50 in RPI (Fullerton at 17 and Long Beach State at 11). The reasons for the up-and-down start to the season are varied—Big West teams generally play difficult non-conference schedules, several teams have suffered injuries to key players, some of the league’s top draft prospects have struggled as juniors—and there is reason for optimism in the second half of the season.

“I think it’s completely wide open,” Beach coach Troy Buckley said. “The parity in college baseball is just that and it rolls downhill to our conference as well. Anybody can take care of this conference.”

TOP 25 SERIES

(1) Oregon State at (15) Stanford

(2) Louisville at (19) Virginia

(3) Texas Christian at Kansas State

(4) Texas Tech at (17) Oklahoma

(5) Clemson at Georgia Tech

(6) South Carolina at (18) Auburn

(7) North Carolina at (12) Florida State

(8) Florida at Missouri

Texas A&M at (9) Louisiana State

(10) Cal State Fullerton at UC Riverside

Jacksonville at (11) Florida Gulf Coast

Southern California at (13) Arizona

Hofstra at (14) St. John’s

Vanderbilt at (16) Kentucky

Mississippi State at (20) Mississippi

(21) Arkansas at Alabama

(22) Baylor at Washington

(23) Houston at Central Florida

(24) Wake Forest at Miami

Connecticut at (25) East Carolina

The first weekend of Big West action features a matchup between Beach and UC Santa Barbara, two of the teams ranked in the Preseason Top 25. Beach (14-10) has had mixed results this season, with its resume highlighted by a sweep of Fullerton in a nonconference series and a series win at North Carolina, but also includes getting swept at Arizona State. UCSB (10-12) stumbled out of the gate this season, starting 5-10 before winning five of its seven games in the last two weeks.

UCSB is 2-9 on the road this season, and lost series at Brigham Young, Kentucky and Loyola Marymount. But the Gauchos have played their last seven games at home, and coach Andrew Checketts said they have played better since returning to Santa Barbara.

“We’re still a work in progress,” Checketts said. “We’ve had some home cooking last week and a half, two weeks. We have played better, pitched better, played more team offense.

“We have enough pieces there offensively to do some damage. The pitching is still evolving. We need to continue to improve and get better.”

Beach has played a demanding road schedule as well and is 5-9 away from home. But the Dirtbags have excelled at Blair Field, going 8-1, including the sweep of Fullerton last weekend.

Buckley was pleased with the results of the weekend, but more importantly he liked the way the Dirtbags played.

“The best thing I thought about the weekend was the consistent energy,” Buckley said. “They just played the game regardless of whether things went poorly or well, they just played. I don’t think we have done that consistently enough.”

Both teams will be without a key middle infielder this weekend. UCSB junior shortstop Clay Fisher is out for the season with an elbow injury that will require Tommy John surgery. Beach second baseman Jarren Duran was hit in the face by a pitch Sunday against Fullerton, fracturing two bones in his cheek. He will miss at least this weekend and could be out longer depending how the injury has to be treated.

Without Fisher and Duran, both teams will need other players to step up in their lineup. Redshirt junior J.J. Muno has slid over at shortstop for UCSB, though he is still trying to get going at the plate. He is hitting .206/.300/.250 this season.

Both teams’ leading hitter is a junior college transfer. Outfielder Colton Burns stepped right into UCSB’s lineup and is hitting.385/.510/.487 this season. Third baseman Ramsey Romano leads Beach with a .360/.402/.461 line.

Both coaches praised their players’ hittability.

“(Burns) has a really advanced feel for the bat,” Checketts said. “He’s really got a feel for the strike zone. He hits all pitches—he’s hitting off speed, he’s hitting fastballs, he’s hitting velocity—he’s done it against all kinds of pitching.”

“(Romano’s) got really good hand-eye coordination, he’s not afraid to swing and miss,” Buckley said. “He has a high level of confidence and is extremely competitive. He likes being at the plate when it matters, which can’t be said for a lot of players. He just wants to be in those roles. He wants to be the guy.”

Both teams are carrying momentum into this weekend and are eager to carry that into Big West play. For UCSB, it is especially important to start conference play well after its early-season struggles.

“Hopefully it’s good for us on the back end (of the season),” Checketts said. “I think we needed some maturity, needed to grow up. So far they’ve responded pretty well the last couple weeks.”

Lloyd Gives Indiana Lineup A Boost Going Into Big Ten Play

What a difference a day can make.

Struggling to stay above the Mendoza Line in the early parts of the season, Indiana redshirt sophomore Matt Lloyd broke out in a big way last Friday, hitting four home runs and driving in eight runs in a doubleheader sweep at Northwestern.

After his three homers in the first game, and a fourth long ball in his first at-bat of the second game, Indiana stayed with his hot hand for its series finale on Sunday. He went 4-for-5 with a double and two RBIs in another win. Along with his nine-hit, four-homer weekend at the plate, Lloyd also finished two games on the mound, picking up one save.

Lloyd’s big weekend helped Indiana sweep the series at Northwestern on opening weekend of Big Ten Conference play. The Hoosiers (14-9-1) have won 10 of their past 12 going into this weekend’s series against Nebraska (13-10), last year’s conference runner-up.

Lloyd, a transfer from Iowa Western CC, was a key part of Indiana’s recruiting class this year. But he got off to a slow start and had fallen out of the lineup before the Northwestern series. Lloyd’s resurgence at the plate strengthens the Hoosiers’ lineup, coach Chris Lemonis said.

“It gives us an extra lefthanded bat in the lineup,” Lemonis said. “He hits to all fields. He has a good eye and he does have some power. You get a little bit of everything with him in the lineup.”

After a strong week, Lloyd, a native of Okotoks, Alberta, has raised his batting line to .304/.381/.625 with five home runs and a team-high 17 RBIs. On the mound, he is 2-0, 2.79 with two saves in six appearances. After starting the season at third base and playing some first base, he has settled in as a DH and righthanded reliever.

Lloyd’s numbers this spring are finally starting to align with his performance last year as a redshirt freshman at Iowa Western, when he hit .371/.432/.595 with nine home runs and went 7-0, 2.38 on the mound.

Lloyd missed the 2015 season as he recovered from Tommy John surgery.

“I used my surgery as motivation while I was sitting out, to come back and be the best player I could the next year,” Lloyd said. “I was doing my rehab every day and thinking about when I was going to step on the field and be able to play. That really pushed me to get healthy as fast as I could and as well as I could.”

Though the injury originally started on the mound while pitching for the Canadian Junior National Team during spring training in Florida, it wasn’t until months of attempted rehab later that it flared up again while Lloyd was playing the infield.

“I remember we were in Cuba and I was playing second base,” he said. “There was a double-play ball, so I went over to second, caught it, and side-armed it to first. I felt another sharp pain in my elbow, and then after that I found out I needed to get surgery when I was at school.”

Lloyd made a quicker return to the plate after going under the knife, but never gave any thought to staying away from the mound.

“I don’t think the rehab would have been faster if I wasn’t going to pitch,” Lloyd said. “It was about the same. I wasn’t pitching in the fall in my sophomore year, I was just getting back into it and throwing across the diamond, and then it was around January or February when I started pitching again.”

Lloyd’s work on the mound has also been a key part of Indiana’s surge. Two of the Hoosiers’ losses have been a result of blown saves, as was the tie. With Lloyd solidifying the back of the bullpen, and his emergence in the lineup, as well as key hitters such as sophomore third baseman Luke Miller and junior outfielder Logan Sowers bouncing back from poor starts, Indiana is hitting its stride as the season moves into conference play.

Lemonis said this weekend’s series against Nebraska is a big one for Indiana. The Hoosiers are moving into the heart of Big Ten play, with a series at in-state rival Purdue next weekend with Minnesota, Michigan and Maryland following on successive weekends. With a tough upcoming slate, the Hoosiers want to take advantage of their momentum and home-field advantage.

“We’ve got to win series at home,” he said. “They’re a good team that’s playing well. We’ve been playing well too. Hopefully we can keep that going.”

— Alexis Brudnicki

Pitching highlights Pac-12 showdown: No. 1 Oregon State (21-1) leads the nation with a 1.55 team ERA, and its pitching staff has played a large role in its outstanding start to the season. Oregon State, riding a 15-game winning streak, travels this weekend to No. 15 Stanford, which has also excelled on the mound. The Cardinal have a 2.81 team ERA, the 14th best mark in the country.

Runs will likely be hard to come by this weekend in Palo Alto, raising the pressure on both teams’ offenses. The Beavers are led by Preseason All-American infielder Nick Madrigal (.407/.480/.593, 3 HR, 8 SB), while the Cardinal feature Preseason All-American outfielder Quinn Brodey (.333/.356/.560, 4 HR, 2 SB).

This weekend also marks the last showdown between Stanford coach Mark Marquess and Oregon State coach Pat Casey, the Pac-12’s two longest tenured coaches. Casey and Oregon State have the advantage against Stanford and Marquess, who will retire following this season. In Casey’s 23 years with the Beavers, he is 33-23 against Marquess, whose next victory will be the 1,600th of his career.

Texas Tech hits the road again: For the third weekend in a row and fifth of seven weekends this season, Texas Tech will leave Lubbock. The No. 4 Red Raiders (24-4) visit No. 17 Oklahoma (23-5) for a key Big 12 Conference series following back-to-back sweeps at Texas and Wichita State. Texas Tech carries a 10-game winning streak into the weekend.

Texas Tech leads the country in wins, with Oklahoma tied with Florida Gulf Coast and South Florida for second. Neither team has had a losing weekend this year, and the winner of this series will gain an edge in the Big 12 race.

Early battle of SEC division leaders: After two weeks of Southeastern Conference play, No. 18 Auburn and No. 6 South Carolina are both 5-1 in the league and are tied for the lead in their respective divisions. For the Gamecocks (18-6), it is a familiar position. South Carolina won the SEC East last season and is expected to again contend for the title. The Tigers (21-6), however, have been one of the surprises in the league, as they went 23-33 last season and missed the SEC Tournament.

South Carolina is led by its rotation of juniors Wil Crowe (3-0, 2.75) and Clarke Schmidt (3-0, 1.12), and sophomore Adam Hill (1-3, 2.15). The Gamecocks lead the SEC with a 2.74 team ERA and are holding opponents to a .212 batting average. Auburn has a strong rotation of its own, provided ace Keegan Thompson (4-0, 0.70) is over the shoulder tendonitis that forced him to leave his start last Friday at Georgia after four innings. Thompson’s status this weekend is still undecided, but he may be able to start Sunday’s game. Righthanders Casey Mize (3-1, 0.98) and Davis Daniel (2-0, 4.44) will start the first two games of what should be a low-scoring weekend on the Plains.

Off the Wall

Saint Louis opened the season by winning the Alamo Irish Classic in San Antonio, beating Notre Dame twice to take home the title. The Billikens ran their record to 14-2, falling just short of the best start in program history. Now into Atlantic-10 Conference play, SLU (17-6) travels this weekend to Rhode Island (11-10), the defending conference champion.

Baseball America caught up with Billikens righthander Miller Hogan (4-0, 1.18), who has emerged as SLU’s ace this season. The sophomore hopes to help lead the Billikens to their fifth A-10 title in six years after a disappointing 24-31 record last season.

What has been the key to the team’s hot start this season?

“I think it was just kind of the mentality and energy we were bringing to the games. Last year, obviously, you know the season didn’t exactly go ideally, but this year we got pretty much almost a new set of guys with almost half the team being new. Everybody was just on the same page that last year was a fluke and we were going to do everything in our power to make sure that doesn’t happen again. Our focus and energy was just off the charts those first couple weeks.”

What have you been working on that has helped you start the season so well?

“Right before the season started coach (Darin) Henderson and I had been talking. I was struggling to throw a changeup and he helped me develop a splitter literally a week before our season and that’s been kind of a game-changing pitch for me. It’s made my fastball play up quite a bit more. It’s missing a lot of bats. It’s been something that’s really effective for me. But honestly the biggest thing is the attention to detail I’ve been giving off the field between starts, as far as mentally breaking down how each start went and the work I’m putting in with dry work, flat grounds, all that kind of stuff. Just kind of paying as much attention to detail as much as possible and it’s been paying off.”

Who is the best hitter you’ve faced in your career?

“Deon Stafford from St. Joseph’s is definitely the most imposing hitter with the numbers and stuff he put up last year. Just the potential he has to do damage on every pitch is something you have to take into account every time you face him.”

What do you listen to before you pitch?

“I have a playlist on my Spotify account. It varies a little bit. It’s a lot of hard rock and hip-hop music. I titled it “Hiller Mogan” because in high school my friends would always tease me and stuff because days that I would have a start, my demeanor and personality would be completely 180 degrees from days that I wasn’t starting. I was just mentally getting ready to pitch. So I guess that’s where the name of the playlist came from. But it’s a lot of pretty heavy rock—not quite screamo, death metal kind of stuff, but it’s fairly intense. I don’t know if a lot of people would like it, but it does the job, I guess. Honestly, when I know that I’m really locked in is—I don’t listen to it to get pumped up or anything. I kind of use it as an excuse to zone out from everybody else on the field and really focus on the next thing I need to do—warmup, catch, that kind of thing. When I really get in the zone, honestly, I don’t even hear it. It just turns into white noise. I’m just able to zone in on what I need to be doing to be ready to pitch that day.”

What’s your go-to Chipotle order?

“It’s pretty simple, but it’s big. I like to go double wrapped tortilla burrito with double rice, double chicken, the hot salsa, the corn salsa and the cheese. And then you always have to remember to tell them to mix it up before they wrap it so you don’t just get a loaded side of the burrito where you’re only getting hot salsa or you’re only getting chicken in one bite. That’s the biggest thing is making sure they mix it up before they roll it.”