Central Michigan University Athletics
CMU Faces Miami in MAC Tournament First Round
5/21/2007 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
The Chippewas, seeded third in the six-team tournament, will meet the fourth-seeded RedHawks Wednesday at 10 a.m. at Eastern Michigan. CMU and Miami finished runner-up in the MAC West and East Division, respectively. The matchup features two of the premier pitchers in the conference in CMU’s Josh Collmenter (9-3 overall, 1.49 ERA) and Miami’s John Ely (7-3, 2.82).
“Miami is a team that is going to run out some pretty good pitching, and we think we’ll do the same thing,” said CMU head coach Steve Jaksa. “They have guys that can run and they play good defense behind that solid pitching. Having those two guys go against each other is going to be a good way to get the tournament started.”
Pitching depth will likely be the recurring theme of this weekend’s tournament. The top five seeds in the field rank in the top five in the conference in earned-run average.
“If you want to advance in the tournament, your number three and number four starters better be good, and you better have a good bullpen,” Jaksa said. “You try to build that depth on your staff during those midweek games over the course of the season, so this week is when the importance of those midweek games really shows.”
The Chippewas closed the regular season by dropping two of three games at Ball State last week. Both losses were by a single run, including an 11-10, 10-inning loss Saturday.
“I thought we had a really productive meeting when we got back Saturday night,” Jaksa said. “Our guys are going into the tournament with a good attitude and positive outlook, but they know that every team is going to have that same disposition. We’re focused on what we want to accomplish, and our team knows it can do what is needed to win this tournament, which is put together multiple good games in a row.”
Follow the Chippewas: WMMI-AM 830 will broadcast each of CMU’s games in the tournament, with each broadcast streamed live through the CMU Sports Zone on cmuchippewas.com. Live stats of every game in the tournament will be available through Eastern Michigan’s official site, emueagles.com.
Familiar Foe: CMU and Miami will be meeting in the first round of the MAC Tournament for the second consecutive season. The teams have not met in the regular season since 2000, but the RedHawks hold a 4-2 edge in six meetings in the MAC Tournament in the past three seasons alone. Both programs are making their 13th appearance in the MAC Tournament.
Reviewing the 2006 MAC Tournament: CMU defeated Miami, 8-2, in the opening round of the 2006 MAC Tournament at Kent State. The Chippewas were eliminated from the tournament, however, with consecutive losses to Ball State, 12-5, and Miami, 6-3. Noah Lankford was named to the all-tournament team after hitting .455 (5-for-11) with two doubles, a triple and four runs scored in CMU’s three games.
Top of the List: The Chippewas enter the week leading the MAC in hitting and pitching. CMU is batting .308 as a team, while the pitching staff boasts a conference-low 3.51 earned-run average.
Finishing Strong: A three-game sweep at No. 28 Kansas State in mid-March dropped the Chippewas a season-high three games under .500 at 7-10 overall. From that point, CMU won 28 of its final 37 games (.757 winning percentage) to close the season.
20-Win Club: CMU finished the regular season with a 21-6 conference mark. It is the ninth time CMU has won at least 20 MAC games in a season. The Chippewas won 20 of their first 24 MAC games this season, the fastest a CMU team has reached the 20-win mark in conference play.
Tallying Up the Wins: The Chippewas enter the tournament with 35 wins overall, the most in the MAC. This is the third straight season, and 21st season overall, in which CMU has won at least 35 games in a season. CMU has won 112 games over the last three seasons, the most victories in a three-year span since the Chippewas won 118 games from 1993-95.
One-Two Punch: Tyler Stovall leads the Mid-American Conference in batting average (.409), on-base percentage (.480), hits (88), RBI (59) and is tied for second with teammate Ben Humphrey in runs scored (57). Humphrey is second in the MAC in hits (80), doubles (18), tied for second in homers (10) and RBI (51) and fourth in batting average (.360).
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