Griffin unveils 2023 C-N baseball schedule
JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – Closing in on the 2023 season, Carson-Newman baseball coach Tom Griffin released the slate for the upcoming season on Friday featuring 50 games, seven against 2022 NCAA Regional clubs and 23 home affairs for the Eagles.
JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – Closing in on the 2023 season, Carson-Newman baseball coach Tom Griffin released the slate for the upcoming season on Friday featuring 50 games, seven against 2022 NCAA Regional clubs and 23 home affairs for the Eagles.
"The bottom is we didn't get to pick it," Griffin said. "You put something on ABCA that you are looking for a game and whoever calls you, you say let's go and do it. In the beginning you have a couple weeks to figure out what your lineup is going to be. You know the lineup you start with won't be the one you end with.
"Most importantly we are trying to get a lot of arms in early because we have a lot of untested guys. We have a great stable of people. I think coach [Travis] Tingle and [James] Sofield have done a phenomenal job developing these guys in the fall. A lot of veterans but not a lot of innings pitched. We have to figure out early what roles these guys will play."
Diving into the numbers of the 50-game schedule Carson-Newman will play 23 home games and 27 road affairs with 27 South Atlantic Conference contests in the traditional three-game series. The Eagles are on track to travel 5,200 miles which is the equivalent of travelling from Mossy Creek to London with 400 miles to spare or Buenos Aires, Argentina with over 100 miles in the bank.
The Eagles open the year at home for the second year in a row after going 27 years without a home affair to light the lamp for a new campaign. Mars Hill journeys to Mossy Creek on Feb. 1 for a 2 p.m. contest. Out of the 18 contests in February, only six will be played at the friendly confines of the Silver Diamond Baseball Complex.
After road trips to USC Aiken and West Georgia in the first two weeks, the Orange and Blue open the conference slate at home against first-year league member Emory & Henry on Feb. 18-19 for a three-game set.
"Everybody in the league is competitive," Griffin said. "We have seen that over the last couple years. You can tell what's happening when our conference is playing the other conferences and the success that people have had. That's a tribute to the league and the type of coaches and the quality of coaches we have in this league. Every game is competitive. You don't see many sweeps."
In March, Carson-Newman played 11 of 18 games on its home field starting with home weekend series against Mars Hill and UVA Wise before travelling to see Limestone and Newberry.
Four of the team's five midweek contests in the month will be played at home with the lone road trip being a venture to the Music City to take on Trevecca Nazarene on March 7.
With home affairs against King, Lincoln Memorial and Shorter, the Eagles play five in a row at home at the end of March and beginning of April, one of the two times during the year the team plays its longest homestand of the year.
When the calendar flips to April, the Eagles hit the road for eight of 14 games. The lone full series of the month at home is on April 14-15 against reigning SAC Tournament Champions, Lenoir-Rhyne.
C-N wraps up the regular season at Coker on April 21-22 before turning its attention to SAC Tournament action in a new format for the 2023 season. The top four teams from each division will travel to the top seed for a round-robin double elimination tournament from April 28-30. The winners of the divisional pod will convene for a championship series on May 4-5 in a best of three competition.
"We have talked about it in coaches' meetings about what the league has done moving in postseason," Griffin said. "We all realize if we can do that then we will be prepared for regional play. It's helped now that the league has allowed us to move our conference tournament a week later so now we are getting closer to the regional. We have a chance of getting more than one or two teams in it."
The Eagle Sports Network has wall-to-wall coverage of every pitch at the Silver Diamond Baseball Complex all season featuring a video stream on FloSports with your subscription and an audio-only form stream by visiting cneagles.com/live with select road outings available.
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