No. 15 Baseball Hosts Texas State
2/23/2004 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
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No. 15 BAYLOR (3-4)
vs.
TEXAS STATE (8-3)
6:00 p.m. CST
Feb. 24, 2004
Baylor Ballpark
Waco, Texas
Baylor returns to action Tuesday, hosting Texas State for a 6 p.m. CST game at Baylor Ballpark. The Bears (3-4) have dropped three straight after getting swept at eighth-ranked Long Beach State over the weekend. Texas State (8-3) took two of three from Louisiana-Lafayette at home over the weekend. Baylor enters the contest ranked in three of the four national polls. The Bears are 15th according to Baseball America and 20th in the Sports Weekly/ESPN Coaches Poll. Baylor was 15th in the latest (Feb. 16) National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association Top 35. This is the first of two meetings this season between Baylor and Texas State; the Bobcats also visit Baylor Ballpark March 16. All Baylor baseball games are carried in Central Texas on KRZI 1660/1580 AM. Live stats also are available for all home games and most road games at www.BaylorBears.com, the official website of Baylor Athletics and a member of the Official College Sports Network.
QUICK NOTES
* Baylor and Texas State meet for the 45th time Tuesday. The Bears lead the all-time series 32-12.
* Head coach Steve Smith enters Tuesday's contest four wins shy of career victory No. 350.
* RHP Zane Carlson tied Matthew Marcom's school record of 91 career appearances with his three-inning outing Sunday at Long Beach State.
* RHP Zane Carlson needs one save to move into a tie for sixth on the NCAA all-time career saves list. He needs two saves to move into a fifth-place tie.
* Baylor has been ranked nationally for 25 consecutive weeks, dating back to the 2003 preseason rankings. The Bears have appeared in the national rankings during 101 of the last 102 weeks. Baylor has been ranked during each of the past 81 regular-season polls. The Bears' last regular season game as an unranked team was Feb. 21, 1999, an 8-2 victory over then-No. 24 Houston.
THE TEXAS STATE SERIES
Baylor and Texas State meet for the 45th time on the diamond Tuesday. The Bears hold a 32-12 advantage in the all-time series and have won 17 of 24 meetings during head coach Steve Smith's tenure. The teams first met March 26, 1919. Baylor is 26-10 against the Bobcats in Waco.
THE TEXAS STATE BOBCATS
Texas State (8-3) is in its sixth season under the direction of head coach Ty Harrington. A 1989 Texas graduate, Harrington has amassed a 144-106 career record, all coming at Texas State.
TSU Notes: The Bobcats took two of three games at home from Louisiana-Lafayette over the weekend. Texas State started 6-1 and has since gone 2-2. Last Tuesday, the Bobcats dropped a 4-1 decision at Texas. ... Texas State hits .271 as a team with six home runs and four stolen bases. The Bobcats are strong offensively in the outfield. RF Richard Martinez (.395, 0 HR, 7 RBI) leads the team in batting average among regular starters. CF Evan Tierce (.380, 0, 12) is second in batting average, while LF Matt Miller (.289, 3, 15) is tops on the squad in home runs and RBI. ... The Bobcats' pitching staff totes an ERA of 3.41 with three saves, no complete games and 73 strikeouts in 103.0 innings. LHP Patrick Colgan (1-0, 3.00 ERA) is scheduled to get the nod on the bump against the Bears. Colgan has three appearances, all in relief; he has allowed one run on two hits and a walk with three strikeouts in 3.0 innings of work. SS/RHP Dominic Ramos (1-0, 0.00) is the Bobcats closer. He has appeared in five games with two saves and nine strikeouts in 10.2 innings.
SMITH NEARS ANOTHER MILESTONE
Baylor head coach Steve Smith is four wins away from victory No. 350 in his collegiate career, all coming at Baylor. Now in his 10th season at the helm of the Baylor program, Smith is 346-204-1.
CARLSON MATCHES MARCOM'S SCHOOL RECORD
RHP Zane Carlson appeared in his 91st career game Saturday at Long Beach State, tying him with Matthew Marcom for the most pitching appearances in Baylor history. Carlson, who already owned the Big 12 record in this category, needs 21 more appearances to crack the NCAA's all-time top 20 in career appearances.
CARLSON EYES NCAA SAVES MARK
With two saves in the Loyola Marymount series, senior RHP Zane Carlson needs 13 saves to break the NCAA Division I career record. The nation's active career saves leader starting the year, Carlson has 36 during his four-plus seasons at Baylor. Former Southern California closer Jack Krawczyk currently owns the record; he tallied 49 saves from 1995 to 1998. Carlson already owns the Baylor and Big 12 Conference records for career saves. As a freshman in 2000, he established Baylor's single-season saves record with 15, ironically also the school career mark at that time. On top of that, Carlson owns the Cape Cod League career saves record with 24. Carlson needs one save to move into a sixth-place tie on the all-time NCAA list and two saves to move into a fifth-place tie.
BAYLOR IN THE NATIONAL RANKINGS
Baylor dropped three spots in this week's Baseball America Top 25, falling to No. 15. The Bears slipped six spots in the latest Sports Weekly/ESPN Coaches Poll to 20th. Collegiate Baseball, which had Baylor at No. 11 last week, did not include the Bears in this week's ranking of 30 teams. The National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association rankings are not released until Tuesday. The Bears have been ranked nationally for 25 consecutive weeks, dating back to the 2003 preseason rankings. Baylor has appeared in the national rankings during 100 of the last 101 weeks and during each of the past 81 regular-season polls. The Bears' last regular season game as an unranked team was Feb. 21, 1999, an 8-2 victory over then-No. 24 Houston.
VANALLEN HONORED BY COLLEGIATE BASEBALL
LHP Cory VanAllen was named one of five National Players of the Week Monday by Collegiate Baseball. VanAllen was honored after combining with RHP Zane Carlson for a seven-inning no-hitter in Baylor's 1-0 victory over Loyola Marymount in the second game of a doubleheader Sunday at Baylor Ballpark. A true-freshman from Sugar Land, Texas, VanAllen carried a perfect game into the seventh inning before leadoff batter Billy Lockin reached by virtue of an error. Carlson then came in and closed the door on LMU, preserving Baylor's seventh no-hitter and first since 2000. VanAllen is the first Baylor freshman to ever participate in a no-hitter. The southpaw did not walk a batter and struck out four in his 6.0-plus innings of work. Others honored by Collegiate Baseball this week were Zach Jackson (LHP, Texas A&M); Luke Holscher (RHP, Western Michigan); Jered Weaver (RHP, Long Beach State); and David Purcey (LHP, Oklahoma). Baylor is likely to face Jackson, Weaver and Purcey this season.
BIG 12 HONORS VANALLEN, AS WELL
LHP Cory VanAllen joined Oklahoma's David Purcey and Texas A&M's Zach Johnson as Big 12 Conference Pitchers of the Week, the league office announced Tuesday. Jackson also tossed a no-hitter as the Aggies blanked Texas A&M-Corpus Christi 15-0 in seven innings Saturday. Purcey hurled seven shutout innings as the Sooners blanked Arizona State 6-0 Sunday, snapping ASU's NCAA-record of 506 consecutive games without being shutout. Texas 2B Seth Johnson earned Big 12 Player of the Week honors.
2004 SCHEDULE AMONG NATION'S TOUGHEST
Baylor's 2004 schedule ranks as the nation's 10th-toughest, according to the preseason schedule rankings released by BoydsWorld.com. The Bears' 2003 schedule was ranked first in the preseason rankings and was deemed the fifth-toughest by season's end. One component of schedule strength is the strength of one's opponents' schedules. Baylor plays 13 teams ranked the preseason top 30 in the strength of schedule rankings: Arizona (2nd), Cal-Irvine (4th), Texas (5th), Long Beach State (7th), Texas A&M (13th), Houston (14th), Oklahoma (19th), Rice (20th), Texas Tech (22nd), Oklahoma State (23rd), Texas State (25th), Loyola Marymount (26th) and Nebraska (28th).
BAYLOR AMONG ALL-TIME WINNINGEST PROGRAMS
With 1,780 all-time wins in 102 seasons of collegiate baseball, Baylor ranks 39th nationally in total victories to start the 2004 campaign, according to the NCAA Baseball Records Book. Baylor is sixth in the Big 12, trailing Texas (2nd/2,760); Texas A&M (19th/2,094); Oklahoma State (22nd/2,057); Oklahoma (26th/2,006); and Missouri (36th/1,834). Fordham, which first fielded a team in the 1850s, leads all schools with 3,174 victories in 145 seasons. Baylor also ranks 23rd nationally in total victories through the first four seasons of the 21st century with 163. That ranks third in the Big 12 behind Nebraska (5th/195) and Texas (7th/189).
BEARS BEST IN THE BIG 12
At the start of the 2004 season, Baylor has the best conference record of any team in the Big 12 Conference since the league's start in 1997. At 124-71 (.636), the Bears are ahead of Texas Tech (120-77-1, .609). Included in the first seven seasons for Baylor are one Big 12 championship (2000) and a pair of runner-up finishes (1998, 1999). On top of that, Baylor is the only Big 12 Conference school to have ranked in the top 10 nationally during each of the past six seasons (1998-2003). Including the 2003 totals, Baylor leads all conference schools in Big 12 history in both first-team all-Big 12 selections (21) and in first-team Academic all-Big 12 selections (35).
UP NEXT ...
Baylor remains at home this weekend, hosting No. 16 Arizona for a three-game series at Baylor Ballpark. The Bears and the Wildcats meet Friday at 6 p.m. CST, Saturday at noon and Sunday at 1 p.m. Baylor took two of three at Tucson last season.
