Carson-Newman Baseball Game Notes

JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – With nine South Atlantic Conference games remaining this season, the Carson-Newman Eagles (17-20, 9-12) realize that it is time to start stringing together some wins as they try to make a push for the top six teams in the league to make it to the conference tournament.

"It feels good to have a chance, doesn't it?" head coach Tom Griffin said of his team that currently sits in eighth. "Last year we went through a stretch and we ended up getting to the conference tournament final, one game from getting to a regional. This team has been through some adversity."

Carson-Newman is on a season-long four game losing streak and is three games under .500 for the first time this season, but none of those losses have come against SAC opponents. The nine conference wins are tied with two other programs for the sixth-most in the league meaning the Eagles could essentially control their own destiny if they put together some wins over the next three weekends.

The sprint to the finish line begins this weekend as the Newberry Wolves (19-19, 10-11 SAC) come to Mossy Creek for a three-game series beginning Saturday at 1 p.m. for a doubleheader and concluding Sunday afternoon at 1 p.m. The Wolves currently have a stranglehold of the final conference tournament position.

For Griffin's group, now is the time for everything to begin clicking. There was a time in March when the Eagles could not score, but the pitching was solid. Of late, the Eagle pitching staff has hit a skid. Over the last month of baseball, the team earned run average has risen from 3.66 to 4.68. At that time, Carson-Newman was on par with Tusculum for the top pitching unit in the league. Now, the Eagles rank seventh in team ERA and have walked 132 men, tenth out of 11 teams in the SAC.

"The offense I feel has gotten into a pretty good groove," Griffin said of the recent play. "Our pitching has struggled with location and falling behind early. These are lessons that we are learning. The guys are disappointed with this last month because we had set some goals for the month, but they are going to come and play hard."

Newberry makes the journey to the Silver Diamond Baseball Complex having lost seven of its last ten games. The Wolves are third in the SAC with a .299 team batting average and fourth in the league with a 4.08 ERA.

Junior outfielder Alex Kirby leads the conference with a .400 batting average this season including 13 multi-hit contests. Infielder Albert Baur is fifth in the SAC with 36 runs batted in on the year.

Newberry boasts two of the top starting pitchers in the league. Freshman Jake Nidiffer and junior Wesley Camp rank second and third respectively in ERA this year as both have an earned run average under two.

The Eagles and Wolves have met 41 times prior to this weekend with Carson-Newman holding a decisive 36-15 advantage. Carson-Newman won two out of three games a season ago outscoring Newberry 11-2 in the two victories.

All three games this weekend will be featured on cneagles.com/live with a video and audio stream. Pregame coverage begins ten minutes prior to the first pitch of each contest.

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