GAMEDAY: Tops vs. Lipscomb
Photo courtesy of WKU Athletic Media Relations
The baseball Tops have finally set a permanent time for when they will take on the Bison of Lipscomb. After receiving a nice handful of snow and ice from mother nature in Bowling Green, the game had been rescheduled for this afternoon with the hopes of the field clearing in time to get the game in. However with a quick look outside of my dorm window tells me that it doesn’t look like there will be enough daylight to melt the snow and ice. So, with the quick thinking of Mr. Todd Stewart and the AD at Lipscomb, both teams have decided to flip flop the home and home series and just head down to Nashville on Wednesday and play the game there then come on up to BG and play the April installment at Nick Denes Field. So here y’all have it, the Hilltoppers will take on the Bison in Nashville on today at 4 p.m.
The Tops, who are coming off of a week where they went .500 and improved their record to a healthy 7-4, will take on the Bison who are 4-8 on the year. This meeting will be the 75th between the two squads, with the last two meetings resulting in Hilltopper loses by scores of 5-4 and 2-0. Western will look to change the tune of their game as they managed to knock off number 4 ranked Vandy in Nashville last Tuesday, but dropped 2 games to ECU and Ohio St. at the Keith LeClaire Classic at Eastern Carolina over the weekend. That being said, the trip to Charleston wasn’t a total washout, as WKU managed to capture a game from Pittsburgh Sunday morning before returning home to Bowling Green (well, attempting to return home. They got caught in some bad weather on the way back and stopped in north-Tennessee to play it safe).
Western Kentucky will send junior righty Brandon Allen (8.53 ERA) to the mound to start things off tonight. Allen, who has received 2 losses on the season, will make his first actual start for WKU. The Tops will once again look to the bat of senior second-baseman Scott Wilcox to carry the load for the Hilltoppers. Wilcox is now hitting .366 on the season with 8 RBI’s and 2 home runs in 41 at bats. The next Hilltopper to look out for is first baseman Ryan Church, who is batting .289 on the season has 9 RBI’s on 13 hits while boasting 2 long balls also.
The Bison of Lipscomb will send freshman southpaw John Pryor to deliver the pitches against WKU. Pryor, who will see his first ever action in college, was an ESPN All-State selection his senior season posting a .023 Era and sent 109 batters walking to the makeshift fence dugouts in the same season. Bison players to watch are Grant Massey and Tyson Ashcraft – Massey is hitting .350 with 11 runs on 14 hits, with Ashcraft hitting a mediocre .283 but has 10 RBI’s and 3 home runs.
WKU will look to rebound off a poor showing at the Keith Leclaire Classic. For Lipscomb after they face Western they will welcome Oakland to town for a weekend series, for WKU they welcome in Big Ten competition in Illinois for a Weekend Series. A player who needs a wakeup call for WKU is Regan Flaherty. Regan is hitting .111 on the season which is the lowest for Hilltoppers who have over 25 at bats and has only 2 RBI’s. However, Regan is a young player, and he saw a good amount of success in his time on the field last year, but is making the adjustment to an every day player this season. Hopefully he can come around, but luckily for the Tops, their offense (at times) can seem to make up for anything lost with his poor hitting.
The game’s first pitch is scheduled to fly at 4 p.m., and we will have all your post game coverage right here.