GAME 39-42
Dates: April 30 – May 2, 2021
First Pitch: Friday: 12 p.m. & 3:30 p.m.; Saturday: 12 p.m.; Sunday: 11 a.m.
Location: Morehead, Ky.
Stadium: Allen Field (1,000)
Series History: Murray State leads 66-56 (L4)
Last Meeting: May 23, 2019 (MOR Won 2-1)
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Live Video: ESPN+ Game 1 Game 2
Live Stats: Game 1 Game 2 Game 3 Game 4
Twitter In-Game: @RacersBaseball
Murray State Game Notes
First Pitch
The Racers were on their longest win steak until their midweek loss to Southern Illinois. They are coming of their first sweep of the season against EKU. Morehead State defeated Jacksonville State in two of three games over the weekend to stay atop the OVC.
Inside the Matchup
The Racers and Eagles have met 122 times on the diamond before with Murray State holding a 66-55-1 series lead. Two season ago, the Racers were swept by the Eagles in Morehead. In Morehead, the Racers hold a 33-32 advantage.
Probable Starters
Friday Game 1 - Jack Wenninger (RHP) (4-3, 4.54 ERA) vs Jason Goe (RHP) (2-4, 4.73 ERA)
Friday Game 2 – Shane Burns (LHP) (1-1, 4.83 ERA) vs Luke Helton (RHP) (3-1, 5.49 ERA)
Saturday – Sam Gardner (RHP) (3-4, 5.40 ERA) vs John Sherman (RHP) (1-0, 6.52 ERA)
Sunday (Non-Conference) - TBD vs TBD
Big Sluggers
The series features two of the OVC's top slugging teams as Morehead State and Murray State both rank in the top-three of the league in both home runs and team slugging percentage. The Eagles rank third in home runs (43) and second in slugging (.445) while the Racers rank first in home runs (50) and third in slugging (.442).
A Look at the Racers:
Murray State sits third in the conference standings only behind Morehead State and Southeast Missouri with an overall record of 21-17 and a conference record of 11-7. They have won series four of their six series.
The Racer began the second half of their Ohio Valley Conference schedule with a sweep of last place Eastern Kentucky over the weekend. Murray State will play road series at Morehead State (Apr. 30-May 1) and SIUE (May 14-15), and host UT Martin (May 7-8) and Austin Peay (May 20-21) in its final two home series to close out its 30-game conference slate.
After dropping back-to-back conference series versus Southeast Missouri and Belmont in which they were outscored 36-18 in their losses. The Racers got back on track against Eastern Kentucky sweeping the Colonels for their first conference series sweep of the season. The Racers used strong pitching, stellar defense and timely hitting to put together three "team" wins.
Murray State tied a program record with three triples in Saturday's 7-3 win seeing Slunder hit his third of the season, second of the series, Jacob Pennington his first career and Ryan Perkins his first of the season.
Murray State was riding a five-game win streak that ended on Tuesday at Southern Illinois with a 5-4 loss. Their previous long this season was four games. This was their longest since they won five in a row Apr. 23-29, 2017.
Bryson Bloomer has been on a tear in the month of April batting .433 with an on-base pct of .462 and slg pct of .650. He has a team-high 27 hits, 8 doubles and 14 RBI in the month and is outhitting the next closest Racer by 8 hits. Since his hot-streak, Bloomer's batting average has improved 101 points to highest on the team at .301, collecting 10 of his 13 multi-hit games during this time.
Jake Slunder is showing off his lighting quick speed, swiping 17 bases so far this season, tied for 23rd best in the nation. Slunder has legged out three triples, 29th-most in the country and 2nd in the OVC. He also has an active six-game streak, the longest active on the team. 12 of his 44 hits have been infield singles and scored from second on a wild pitch.
After a slow start to the season in which he was 0-4 in five starts with an ERA as high as 15.58, Gardner has found his groove in his last four outings. He has thrown 28.2 innings with an ERA of 1.26, only allowing four earned runs. Gardner matched his career-high in strikeouts, nine, thrice in this span and walked just four batters. He was named OVC Pitcher of the Week for his complete game shutout performance against Belmont on last Sunday.
Scouting Morehead State
The Morehead State Eagles were predicted to finish ninth in the OVC in the preseason poll but with a 20-15 overall record and a 9-3 conference record in the first half, the Eagles sit atop the OVC.
Morehead State has won every conference series so far against Eastern Kentucky, SIUE, Austin Peay, Eastern Illinois and Jacksonville State taking two of three from each.
The Eagles are being outhit in most offensvie categories by their opponents and 13 of their 20 wins have come by three runs or less.
Jackson Feltner is one of four players in the OVC with a batting average over .400 (.409) and is second-best among NCAA freshman. He leds the Eagles in doubles and home runs, slugging percentage and on-base percentage.
Bryce Hensor has been the Eagles best scoring threat, with a .366 batting average, he leds the team in runs (41), 17 more than the next closest.
On the mound, Jason Goe has thrown 51.1 innings for the Eagles with a 50-15 K-BB ratio. John Bakke has made 21 appearances, picking up six saves.
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April 30, 2021 at 11:23PM
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Racers Ready for Four-Game Battle with Morehead State - MSU GoRacers
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