Baseball Wraps Up Road Sched this Weekend

[Brad]

Courtesy USF

USF BASEBALL

Bulls Conclude Regular-Season Road Schedule At Seton Hall May 11-13

TAMPA, Fla. (May 9, 2007) – The University of South Florida baseball team will conclude its 2007 regular-season road schedule May 11-13 when the Bulls travel to South Orange, N.J., to play Seton Hall at Owen T. Carroll Field. The Bulls and Pirates will take the field at 6 p.m. on Friday, at 1 p.m. on Saturday, then at noon on Sunday.  

USF is sixth in the BIG EAST with a 10-11 conference record and 28-21 overall clip. Seton Hall is 21-22 overall and 6-12 in the league, which places the Pirates 11th out of the 12 conference schools.  

USF holds a 3-0 lead in the all-time series with Seton Hall following a conference sweep of the Pirates in Tampa last season. USF won the first game 2-1 on March 24, then picked up a pair of wins, 3-1 and 11-9, the following two days.  

The Bulls are currently on a five-game slide, dropping three games to No. 24 Georgia Tech (May 5-7) and two in Louisville (April 28-29). USF’s last win was a 10-4 victory over the Cardinals in Louisville on April 27. The Bulls are 3-11 in the past month.  

Seton Hall has won its last two outings, including a 10-4 victory over NYIT on Tuesday and a 15-1 win over Notre Dame on May 6. The Pirates dropped 2-of-3 to the Fighting Irish and all three to Louisville in the past two weeks. SHU is 4-6 in its past 10 games.  

Juniors Walter Diaz and Dexter Butler are atop the Bulls’ leaderboard in numerous offensive categories, as Diaz leads the team and Butler is second in batting average, hits and doubles. Diaz is pacing the team with 52 runs and 88 total bases as well.  

Senior Danny Otero will open the weekend series on the mound for the Bulls, making his 14th start of the season. Otero has posted a 3.32 ERA with 76 strikeouts in 97.2 innings so far this year. Freshman Shawn Sanford, who has a 3.48 ERA with 10 saves, will start Saturday’s game. On Sunday, the Bulls will start junior Chris Delaney, who is 8-2 with 48 strikeouts in 13 appearances.  

Greg Miller leads the Pirates with his .335 batting average, which includes 54 hits, 37 runs and 16 RBI. John Walsh has tallied 38 RBI from eight home runs, two triples and 11 doubles, connecting on a team-high 56 hits.  

The Pirates will look to Keith Cantwell, Corey Young and Dan Merklinger on the mound this weekend. Cantwell has posted a team-low 3.26 ERA in eight starts. Young is 2-5 in 10 starts, owning a 4.28 ERA, while Merklinger has a team-high 65 strikeouts in his 10 starts for SHU.

Following the weekend series with Seton Hall, the Bulls will host Stetson at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, May 15, then will wrap up the 2007 regular season at home against St. John’s on May 17-19. The Bulls and Red Storm will play at 6 p.m. on Thursday and Friday, then at 1 p.m. on Saturday.

[JoeB]

Time for the baseball team to start winning again.  Need to win 2 out of 3 to secure a Big East Tourney spot.  Anything less and we'll be on the bubble to make it.

[RankBull]

We need to win three of our final six conference games, and I think we will definitely make the BE tournament. My projections for the last two series for our closest competition for the final three conference tournament spots:

USF @ SHU, USF wins series 2-1

SJU @USF, SJU wins series 2-1     Final USF conference record 13-14

UC @ SJU, SJU wins series 2-1

UL @ UC, UL wins series 2-1      Final UC conference record 11-16

VU @ GU, VU wins series 3-0

RU @ VU, RU wins series 2-1      

UL @ VU(make up) UL wins 1-0  Final VU conference record 12-15

WVU @ UConn, WVU wins series 2-1

GU @ WVU, WVU wins series 3-0

UC @ WVU(make up) WVU wins 1-0  Final WVU conference record 13-14

This scenario put USF in 6th, WVU in 7th, and VU in 8th. If we only win 2 of our final six then we would still make the tourney in 8th with this scenario. If UC were to tie us in record, then I guess there might be a one game playoff? Not sure how tie breakers would be handled. We would hold the heads up tie breaker on WVU and VU would hold the heads up tiebreaker on USF.

Its gonna be close. Go Bulls!!