JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – With just two weekends of the conference regular season remaining, two of the top teams in the South Atlantic Conference in Carson-Newman (22-18, 15-9 SAC) and Wingate (25-17, 16-8 SAC) are set to meet in a decisive three-game series that begins tomorrow evening at 6:00 p.m.
The Eagles enter this pivotal conference series with the Bulldogs having won eight of its last ten South Atlantic Conference games. On March 24th, C-N was an even .500 in league play but has flipped since then, winning eight of its last ten SAC games. This success has put Carson-Newman in the thick of the race for the number two seed in the South Atlantic Conference Baseball Tournament. The two seed being important because the top two seeds serve as host for the two separate four-team double elimination brackets that will decide who plays in the championship series.
C-N is one game back of both Wingate and Coker who are both 16-8. It sets the Eagles up for a situation where they basically control their own destiny the rest of the way, because they play Wingate this weekend and then Coker next weekend. Win the final two series of the season and things could align well for Carson-Newman's chance to finish as a top two seed. Carson-Newman is currently tied for fourth in the league with Newberry but holds the tiebreaker thanks to winning two of three in a February series. The 2016 season is the last time a Tom Griffin team finished second in the league.
Carson-Newman won five of its final six games to end the month of March and those winning ways carried into the final month of the regular season. Despite losing twice in its last three games, C-N was able to win four of its first five games in April, all of which came in league play. The offense has fared well through the halfway point of April, hitting .315 as a club and averaging eight runs per game, two more than it averages for the season.
Hunter Harritan (Huntersville, N.C.) is climbing the single season record books in two separate categories. His nine saves this season are the fourth-most in a single-season, three away from tying Will Gardner and John Butler for second place. Harritan has a 1.91 ERA which currently sits as the third-lowest mark in a single-season among those who have pitched at least 25 innings.
A series history that spans 105 meetings has been controlled by Wingate the last several seasons. Wingate has won eleven of the last twelve meetings in the series, with four of those wins decided by less than two runs. Prior to this recent stretch that has favored the Bulldogs, C-N had won five in a row including a sweep in Jefferson City in 2017.
Wingate enters its penultimate conference series and its final home games of the regular season with a 25-17 overall, having lost two of its last three games. Prior to dropping two of its three home games against Lenoir-Rhyne last weekend, WU had not lost a home SAC game since the beginning of March. The Bulldogs home record is 14-9 this season.
WU has had winning streaks of five and seven games long this season, those coming at the end of February and middle of March.
The Bulldogs have hit the most home runs in the South Atlantic Conference this season with 60 as a club, 15th most in DII as well. Sean Barnett leads the power-hitting attack with 14 home runs and 56 RBI. Brett Adams follows close behind with 11 home runs and 55 RBI and is hitting .382 this season.
Jeff Gregory's team pairs the long ball hitting with a quality pitching staff that has the third lowest team earned run average in the conference at 5.20. Kelan Hoover is the club's top starter with a 3.61 ERA in ten starts with 38 strikeouts in 52 innings on the mound. The right-hander has pitched into the eighth inning in two of his last three starts. Brent Walls has the lowest ERA on the team with a 2.77 mark in 26 innings out of the bullpen.
Wingate has only played in eight games decided by two runs or less. Compare that to the fact that C-N is 15-4 in two-run games this year.
The three-game series begins Friday at 6:00 p.m and concludes with a doubleheader starting Saturday at 1:00 p.m. The contests will air with an audio-only stream on cneagles.com/live. They can also be viewed on FloSports by going to cneagles.com/flobase
