ELLENSBURG, Wash. (May 7) – The field is set for the 2018 Great Northwest Athletic Conference Baseball Championships as the Central Washington University baseball team enters the tournament as the number three seed. The Wildcats will play No. 2 Western Oregon University.
GNAC CHAMPIONSHIP GAME INFORMATION
Wednesday, May 9
Game 1 | 11:30 a.m. | No. 3 Central Washington vs No. 2 Western Oregon
Game 2 | 3:00 p.m. | No. 1 Montana State Billings vs No. 4 Concordia (Ore.)
Thursday, May 10
Game 3 | 9:30 a.m. | Loser Game 1 vs Loser Game 2
Game 4 | 12:30 p.m. | Winner Game 1 vs Winner Game 2
Game 5 | 3:30 p.m. | Winner Game 3 vs Loser Game 4
Friday, May 11
Game 6 | 12:00 p.m. | Winner Game 4 vs Winner Game 5
Game 7 | 3:00 p.m. | Winner Game 6 vs Loser Game 6 (if necessary)
Live Stats/Live Video: For all games
QUOTABLE
"It gets back to what we always talk about," CWU Head Coach
Desi Storey said. "Playing good baseball. Western Oregon is a good team and we match up well with them. Whoever wins game one will have a strong chance to play for the championship. We just have to play good baseball and the cards will fall into place."
SCOUTING WESTERN OREGON UNIVERSITY
The Wolves (24-20, 24-16) enter the 2018 GNAC Baseball Championship after splitting with Northwest Nazarene in the final weekend of regular season play.
Jay Leverett led Western Oregon's offense with a .356 batting average. Jared McDonald finished with an average of .340, eight homeruns, and 29 runs batted in. Connor McCord led the Wolves with nine homeruns and 40 RBIs. Amongst qualifiers within the Wolves' roster, only two have an average below .300, as Griffey Halle (.295) and Justin Spinner (.204) did not reach the .300 plateau. Halle, however, did drive in 26 runs and send four pitches over the fence. Halle is also the leader in the Western Oregon clubhouse with 10 steals.
Alex Roth (5-0, 2.60 ERA) and Jacob Fricke (2-1, 2.79 ERA) combined for a 7-1 record in 14 starts. They combined for 90.2 innings, 81 strikeouts, and four shutouts.
Kolby Bales (3-0, 1.29 ERA) and Jake Simmons (2-2, 2.13 ERA) combined for 26 relief outings. In 46.1 combined innings, Bales and Simmons struck out 36 hitters and allowed just nine earned runs.
The Wolves pitching staff combined for an ERA of 4.51 on the season, with 284 strikeouts. Against CWU this year, the Wolves posted an ERA of 3.66 in the season series. They struck out 43 hitters, but allowed five homeruns.
LAST TIME OUT
The Wildcats' offense went to town on the final day of the regular season, scoring in double digits against Montana State Billings. After sending 11 runners across the plate in game one, the Wildcats drove in 21 runs in the regular season finale. It was the seventh highest single-game run output in CWU baseball history.
The Wildcats split with Montana State Billings in the regular season's final weekend. They scored 32 runs on the season's final day for a pair of victories.
The last time Western Oregon and Central Washington played one another, the Wolves took three of four from the Wildcats. Central Washington took game two, 5-3. In game four, the score was tied at 3-3 before Western Oregon hit a walk-off homerun.
In the season's first meeting between the two sides, the Wildcats took only the fourth and final game of the series. The Wolves took games one and two by scores of 13-4 and 9-1, before claiming game three 9-0.
Tristin Parton and
James Smith III led the Wildcats against the Wolves in the season series. In six games, Parton hit .450, with one homerun, and five runs batted in. Smith, meanwhile, batted .321 in eight games. He hit three homeruns and drove in nine.
As a unit, the Wildcats hit .267 in eight games. They hit five homeruns and drove in 28 runs, while scoring 31 times.
Last season the Wildcats received an early exit after defeating Northwest Nazarene in the opening game. They fell to Western Oregon (13-7) before a late rally from Northwest Nazarene in an elimination game led to a 7-3 defeat.
