The Missouri State baseball team (21-30, 6-15 MVC) closes the regular season schedule at league-leading Creighton (38-12, 17-4) this weekend in Omaha. The Bluejays are winners of 19 of their last 20 games and have a gaudy 18-1 record at the CU Sports Complex this season with 15 straight victories. The series will take place Thursday through Saturday to accomodate the league tournament that begins next Wednesday (May 23) in Springfield.

Creighton is 38-12 overall and in a tie for first place in the MVC with a 17-4 league record while appearing in the NCBWA poll at 27th this week. The Bluejays bat .297 as a team with sophomore first baseman Darin Ruf (.381-7-52) and senior catcher Chris Gradoville (.359-5-53) leading the way. The Jays are also second nationally with 81 sacrifice bunts.

The pitching staff sports a pair of solid lefthanders and Division I's only ambidextrous pitcher. Senior Marc Lewis (7-1, 3.68) has seen CU win 30 of his last 32 starts, while junior Ben Mancuso is 9-1 with a 2.14 ERA. Pat Venditte uses both of his arms with regularity to accumulate a 2.14 ERA and 7-2 record while leading the league in opponent batting average (.192). Venditte has pitched 27.2 scoreless innings entering the weekend. Closer Andy Masten owns the CU record for saves in a season with 13 this year.

Creighton leads the league in fielding percentage (.977) and double plays (63) while ranking in the top five nationally in both categories.

LIVE STATS INFORMATION

Live stats for all Missouri State baseball games will be available at www.missouristatebears.com. Just click "Live Stats" on the left side of the page and select the appropriate game.

RADIO INFORMATION

All three games from the CU Sports Complex in Omaha can be heard on KBFL 1060 AM in Springfield.

Creighton leads the all-time series 30-28 and is the only Missouri Valley Conference team besides Wichita State to have a winning record against the Bears. The Jays swept Missouri State at home in 2005, and the teams split four meetings last season, with CU winning two of three in Springfield before Ross Detwiler hurled a complete-game one-hitter in the MVC Tournament for a 3-1 win.

COACH KEITH GUTTIN

Missouri State head coach Keith Guttin (Missouri-St. Louis, 1978) is in his 25th season as head coach of the baseball Bears and has a career record of 862-532 (.618). Guttin became the first coach at Missouri State (in any sport) to reach the 800-win mark with the May 11, 2005, win over Kansas at Hammons Field. In 2003, Guttin led the Bears to the NCAA Division I College World Series for the first time in school history. Guttin has been a conference Coach of the Year nine times with three of those coming in the Valley and six coming during the Bears’ years in the Mid-Continent Conference. During Guttin’s tenure, the Bears have made seven Division I NCAA Tournament appearances -- six in the last 12 years.

Missouri State suffered two more losses in the ninth inning over the weekend in losing a league series at home to Indiana State. On Friday, Ross Detwiler struck out a career-high 14 batters in eight innings and left with a 3-2 lead only to see the bullpen give up a two-run single to ISU's Chris Schmidt that gave the Sycamores a 4-3 victory. The Bears put two men on in the ninth but grounded into a game-ending double play.

Scott Carroll allowed a run and struck out eight in eight innings Saturday before giving way to Matt Frevert who closed the door for the save in his first appearance since April 17. Brayden Drake supplied all four MSU runs, scoring after a double in the third and smacking his second double with the bases loaded in the fourth in the 4-1 win.

On Sunday, the Bears staged a late rally of their own using an RBI hit by Tanner Mattson in the seventh and a Drake homer in the eighth to pull even at 5-5 from a 5-3 deficit. Unfortunately, MSU still had to play the ninth inning, yielding five runs with two outs in a 10-5 defeat.

QUICK HITS

According to the NCAA stats through May 13, Missouri State ranks in the top 30 in the following categories:

14th in double plays per game (1.06)

29th in strikeouts per nine innings (7.9)

Ross Detwiler appears among the NCAA leaders in the following categories:

36th in ERA (2.28)

15th in strikeouts/nine innings (11.3)

23rd in strikeouts (99)

Detwiler made his mark on three pages of the MSU record book Friday against Indiana State. His 14 strikeouts rank as the seventh-best single-game total in school history.

He moved into a tie with his 2006 season for the fourth-highest season total with 99, and jumped from seventh to fourth in the career list with 233.

Missouri State's three seniors, Shane Elenz, Tanner Mattson and Chris Taylor, have combined to hit .333 with 25 RBIs in the last 12 games.

Elenz (1st - .341), Mattson (2nd - .333) and Taylor (3rd - .324) rank as the squad's top three hitters over that span, while each has recorded a hitting streak of at least six games.

Missouri State's middle infielders have carried the offensive load in league contests, with Matt Lawson (.345) and Tanner Mattson (.333) atop the team's batting statistics.

Lawson is a .352 hitter in 57 career MVC contests.

Mattson has reached base safely in 10 straight games with a .394 batting average, .636 slugging percentage and .512 on-base figure in that time.

Missouri State is outscoring opponents 42-17 in the first inning.

Nolan Keane is batting .455 (20-44) in the first inning this season while drawing an additional six walks for a .520 on-base percentage. He has come to the plate 50 times in the first inning.

Missouri State has been hot this season in the fifth and sixth frames, batting a combined .321 with 15 homers in those middle innings.

The Bears' top two starters, Ross Detwiler and Scott Carroll, have a combined ERA of 2.53 in 153 innings but are just 8-7 and the team is 9-14 when they start.

Both Detwiler (8th- 3.19) and Carroll

(9th- 3.29) appear on Missouri State's career ERA list.

In the last 20 games, MSU opponents are fielding .980 with a mere 15 errors. A .980 fielding percentage would rank No. 1 in the country.

The Bears have played 20 games since the losing skid began April 8. In that time, MSU has scored in 45 innings and opponents have responded by scoring 23 times in the very next time at bat.

Missouri State on the other hand, has plated a run just 14 times in response to 56 scoring innings by the opposition.

The Bears ended their losing streak at 14 games with a 13-2 win at Evansville May 6. The previous long was seven games in 2005. Why did MSU lose games in a row? Below are some statistics that help explain it:

Hit .245 as a team

Fielded .947 with 28 errors

Opponents fielded .983

Hit .221 with runners on base

Hit .214 with runners in scoring position

Averaged 3.5 runs per game

Ten of 14 games decided by one or two runs

 

Missouri State is 7-24 in games decided by three runs or less.

Missouri State pitching recently had a streak of 65.2 innings from April 6-20 without allowing a home run.

The Bears bullpen had an even more impressive homerless streak, going 88 innings over a stretch of 32 games from March 7 to April 22 without allowing a long ball.

Ross Detwiler's streak of 14 starts going at least six innings and allowing three earned runs or fewer ended April 27 at Southern Illinois. Detwiler had an ERA of 1.53 with 120 strikeouts in 102 innings, and an opponent average of .169, in those 14 starts.

The 3.2 inning start at SIU was also the first time in 20 appearances he did not make it 5.2 innings.

Detwiler recently moved into fourth place on Missouri State's career strikeouts list. He has fanned 233 batters in his career.

Ben Woodbury recently went 83 at bats and 100 total plate appearances without striking out, the longest such streak in the MVC this season. He is ranked as the 79th most difficult batter to strike out in the NCAA.

Matt Frevert is averaging 15.6 strikeouts per nine innings this season, posting a 0.47 ERA with four saves in 12 appearances.

The NCAA record for K/9 (based on at least one IP per team game) was set at 16.8 by Ryan Wagner of Houston in 2003.

This year's leader is Josh Dew of Troy, who is averaging 13.9. Again, Frevert has not logged enough innings to qualify for this statistic.

Frevert has pitched nine separate ninth innings this season, allowing just three hits to go with 15 strikeouts in those appearances.

Tim Clubb's complete-game and shutout against Arkansas State on 3/20 were the first by an MSU freshman since Brett Sinkbeil versus Indiana State in 2004. Sinkbeil's was in a seven-inning game.

Since allowing 10 runs in his first outing of the season, Clubb has a 3.30 ERA and .262 opponent average in 71.0 innings since.

Missouri State has turned 54 double plays this season. Second baseman Matt Lawson ranks second in the MVC as a part in 45 of them, and leads the nearest non-first baseman by four.

Lawson already ranks sixth in MSU history with 362 career assists and ninth with 89 double plays.

The Bears tied a school record with five sacrifice flies in the victory against SEMO on April 3.

Missouri State has a .361 (22-61) batting average with the bases loaded and has walloped three grand slams.

Austin Todd has an ERA of 1.31 and opponent batting average of .145 in true road games.