Eagles begin SAC baseball Tournament with Wingate
Three-seeded Carson-Newman (35-15) meets sixth-seeded Wingate (25-23) for the first time this season as the two clubs kick off South Atlantic Conference Tournament play in the opening round on Friday afternoon at 3:00 p.m. from Durham Field in Hickory, North Carolina.
| Final | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | R | H | E |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Wingate
|
4 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 8 | 9 | 0 |
|
Carson-Newman
|
0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 6 | 1 |
JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – Three-seeded Carson-Newman (35-15) meets sixth-seeded Wingate (25-23) for the first time this season as the two clubs kick off South Atlantic Conference Tournament play in the opening round on Friday afternoon at 3:00 p.m. from Durham Field in Hickory, North Carolina.
The Eagles enter the postseason having exceeded preseason expectations. C-N finished the regular season in third place by four games, after being projected to finish seventh in the preseason poll. C-N's 35 wins are tied for the third-most in the Griffin era.
Carson-Newman (35-15) has won four SAC Championships (1992, 1993, 1997 and 2007) since the tournament began in 1991. Catawba (9) and Wingate (7) are the only schools with more titles. Tusculum has also won four trophies. C-N will begin tournament play in a pod with three other teams, two seed Lenoir-Rhyne, opening round opponent and sixth seeded Wingate and the seven seed UVA Wise. Carson-Newman went 4-2 versus LR and Wise in the regular season and did not play Wingate. Both of those series with the Bears and Cavaliers were C-N home games.
The Eagles hold a 59-53 record in the league tournament with this season being the third time since 2015 that the postseason is not played in full at Smokies Stadium and the second straight year the championship series will not be played there as well. Carson-Newman has won a SAC Tournament game in four consecutive seasons. The program is 26-25 in SAC Tournament games played in North Carolina. The regular season champion has won the tournament title 15 times in 33 tries while a top four team has won all but two championships.
Carson-Newman pitching has held opposing offenses to two runs or less 22 times this season. It's tied for the most occurrences of holding an opponent to two runs or less in the Tom Griffin era. During the 2008 season, Carson-Newman baseball's winningest season in DII, C-N held opponents to two runs or less 22 times throughout that season that featured a trip to the NCAA Tournament.
Kolton Casson's (Benton, Tenn.) remarkable freshman season has inked his name in C-N's record books. His 12 wins this season are the most in DII, and the second-most in a season in program history. His six complete games are fourth-most nationally and also tied for the second-most in a season in program history. Casson's 2.22 earned run average is the program's lowest by a starting pitcher in the DII era.
Logan Floyd (Adairsville, Ga.) is having another impressive season at the plate. He has hit safely in 20 straight games, C-N's first player with a hit in 20 straight games since Mills Rogers in 2010. Floyd leads the Eagles in batting average (.378), hits (68) and runs batted in (48).
When Carson-Newman matches up with Wingate on Friday afternoon, it will be the 14th time the two schools meet in the South Atlantic Conference Baseball Championships. Wingate has won the last three postseason meetings including six of the last seven. The Bulldogs enter the postseason playing some of their best baseball of the season. They won each of their last two series of the year over Limestone and Emory & Henry to qualify for the postseason tournament and finish above .500. Head coach Jeff Gregory's club went exactly .500 during the conference regular season to be the sixth seed.
Despite not ranking high in some offensive categories, success at the plate has translated into most of WU's wins. Its last six victories have seen them scoring at least eight runs. The Bulldogs have just three wins when scoring five runs or less this season. Plate discipline is what stands out the most, Wingate ranks second in the league in base on balls in 2025 with 248, one off the league most.
Reigning SAC hitter of the week Jalen Evans is the best hitter with a .363 batting average. No other regular starter hits above .300, while Jake Courville, Breon Ishmael and Cam Harris all rank near the top in hits for the WU this year.
Collin McDougall has been WU's best starting pitcher this season. In 13 starts, the right-handed pitcher is 6-4 with a 4.08 earned run average in 70.2 innings. Chad Harvey is the top reliever posting a 2.08 era in 39 innings with a team-high six saves as well.
First pitch on Friday afternoon in Hickory, North Carolina is at 3:00 p.m. All of C-N's games this weekend at the SAC tournament will air with a free audio stream available courtesy of the Eagle Sports Network on cneagles.com/live.
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