SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS – The University of the Incarnate Word baseball team will be playing at the Irish Alamo Classic for the third straight year this weekend. Due to travel difficulties for Notre Dame and Bradley the original schedule has been changed.
The Cardinals (2-1) will start the classic with a game on Thursday at 6 p.m. against Texas Southern at Wolff Stadium. On Friday, they will host Bradley at 4 p.m. at Sullivan Field. On Saturday, the Cardinals will play Notre Dame at 11:30 a.m. and Gonzaga at 7:30 p.m. with both games at Wolff Stadium.
UIW started the season last weekend when they hosted LIU Brooklyn and beat them two out of three. They won the opener 8-2, lost the middle game 10-7 and won the rubber match 7-4 after trailing 4-1 in the eighth inning.
The Cardinals starting rotation for the weekend will start with
Cody Richey (Fair Oaks/Comfort HS) against Texas Southern,
Bernie Martinez (Laredo/United HS) is slated against Bradley on Friday, lefty
Denson Hull (San Antonio/Churchill HS) against Notre Dame on Saturday and
Jake Bedevian against Gonzaga on Saturday. The three latter ones are freshman and all started for UIW in last weekend's series and got a no decision. Richey pitched one scoreless inning in relief in Friday night's game in which he retired the side in order, including two strikeouts. Last year, Richey started four games and appeared in 16 for the Cardinals. He had a 6.42 ERA and struck out 20 batters in 33.2 innings of work.
The Cardinal offense is hitting .245 with 22 runs scored and seven extra base hits.
Matt Morris (Scottsdale, AZ/Saguaro HS) leads the way with a .400 batting average after going 4-for-10 with a double, a triple, three runs scored and three RBI's against LIU.
Ryan Gonzalez (Corpus Christi/Carroll HS) has five hits in 14 at-bats and leads the team with six runs batted in.
Mark Whitehead (San Antonio/Johnson HS) leads the team with six runs scored and is already two doubles shy of his 2015 total of five doubles.
Bryce Shepherd (Coldspring/Coldspring-Oakhurst HS) has the team's best on-base percentage (.615) after reaching base eight times in 13 plate appearances this past weekend.
Texas Southern (1-3) dropped three out of four games against the University of Illinois-Chicago at home. They won the opener 8-5 but then lost 22-5, 22-8 and 16-3. The Tigers play in the Southwestern Athletic Conference and are one of the favorites to win the conference after winning the SWAC tournament last year and return five starters and 18 players overall. Christian Sanchez and Olajide Oloruntimilehin led the offense in their first series. Sanchez collected five hits, including two homeruns, and scored four runs and drove in five. Oloruntimilehin hit three home runs, drove in six and scored five times.
Bradley (1-2) started the season on the road and lost two of three to Austin Peay, in Clarksville, TN. They lost 7-1 and 8-4 and won the last game, 9-7. The Braves play in the Missouri Valley Conference and were picked to finish fourth in the eight team conference preseason rankings. Evan Gruener finished the weekend 4-for-12, scored two runs and drove in three. He hit two doubles and a homerun against Austin Peay. As a team, they are hitting .212 this season and have scored 4.7 runs per game.
Notre Dame (1-2) is part of the Atlantic Coast Conference and they lost their opening series at Santa Clara this past weekend. Cavan Biggio, son of former Houston Astro and Hall of Famer Craig Biggio, leads the Irish with four hits in 13 at-bats and two RBI. He hit a homerun in the opening series and was named to the pre-season first team All-American team by Baseball America.
Gonzaga (2-2) split a four-game series at Grand Canyon to start the season. In their two wins, the Bulldogs outscored Grand Canyon 32-11, including a 21-9 route on Saturday. Gonzaga is part of the West Coast Conference and they were picked to finish sixth of 10 teams in the preseason rankings. The offense is hitting .331 and is averaging a whopping 8.3 runs per game. Sam Brown leads the way with an average of .526, going 10-for-19 last weekend, scoring five runs and driving in four.
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