Baseball Visits Charleston for a Weekend Showdown with Cougars
3/24/2011 3:39:00 PM | Baseball
STATESBORO, Ga. - The Georgia Southern Baseball team (13-9, 4-2) travels to Charleston, S.C., to face the previously ranked College of Charleston Cougars (15-7, 2-1) in an important Southern Conference weekend series. Both teams stand in the top five of the conference's standings and will square off three times this weekend at Patriots Point in Mt. Pleasant, S.C. The series gets underway at 6 p.m. on Friday. Saturday's game begins at 3 p.m. and the weekend series conclude with a 1 p.m. game on Sunday.
Charleston took a three game lead in the all-time series, 23-20, with a sweep a year ago at Patriot's Point. All three games were close and were decided in the final innings. The Cougars took the series with a pair of walk-offs in the first two contests and won the series finale 11-8. The Eagles got out to early leads in two of the games and scored in the first inning twice. GSU held a 5-0 lead in game two but a four run fifth inning combined with four more runs over the final two frames gave Charleston the win.
Georgia Southern is winners of its last two contests, but had to come from behind in both the series finale at Samford and Tuesday's win over Kennesaw State. The Eagles trailed in both games 2-1 early on, but got a Victor Roache (Ypsilanti, Mich.) grand slam against the Bulldogs and a six-run eighth inning against the Owls to win the two games.
Eric Phillips (Carrollton, Ga.) leads the Southern Conference's top-hitting squad with a .469 batting average and a 15-game hit streak. The Eagles are the only team in the SoCon hitting above .300 and are also first in on-base percentage with a .393 mark. Steve Cochrane (Mooresville, N.C.) has reached base in every game this season and is second on the team with a .375 batting average.
Charleston has dropped four-straight games after a 24-4 loss to #4 South Carolina on Tuesday. The Cougars faced a tough slate of teams in their third tournament of the season and fell to Southern Miss, Uconn and Rhode Island.
Daniel Aldrich leads Charleston at the plate with the second-best batting average in the league. He is right behind Phillips for the conference's batting title with a .438 average. Aldrich and Matt Leeds pace the SoCon in the home run department with eight each. Leeds has driven in 40 runs this season and has started every game for the Cougars. Preseason SoCon Player of the Year, Cole Rakar, is hitting only .253 with seven RBIs, but is still a dangerous bat in their lineup.
All games can be heard on Eagle 102.9 FM in Statesboro and are also available online at GeorgiaSouthernEagles.com/Eaglevision beginning 30 minutes prior to first pitch. Ryan Chambers of the Georgia Southern Radio Network will call all the action.
Fans may follow Georgia Southern Baseball by visiting GeorgiaSouthernEagles.com/baseball or check in at twitter.com/GSAthletics or facebook.com/GSAthletics for short updates.
