May 12, 2016
- Missouri State is 9-8 in true road games this season, despite dropping its last five away from home; MSU has won a combined 40 road and neutral tilts over the last two seasons
- Dallas Baptist brings a narrow 12-8 edge against the Bears into this weekend's series, as well as a 6-4 mark against MSU in Dallas
- One run has decided 12 of the 20 previous meetings in the series, including all three contests last year in Springfield and eight of the last 12 overall since DBU joined the Valley in 2014
- Jake Burger leads all of Division I baseball with 19 home runs on the season and moved into the Bears' single- season top 10 list with his two-run shot vs. Arkansas on May 3; he needs one more long ball to become the first MSU player since 1999 to reach the 20-homer mark in a season
- Burger, who was named to USA Baseball's Golden Spikes Award watch list on April 20, also leads the Valley in batting (.375), slugging (.729), runs scored (53), hits (72), RBIs (61) and total bases (140)
- Spencer Johnson recorded his 200th career hit May 7 vs. Southern Illinois in his 200th career game as a Bear; with 202 hits, the senior is tied with Keenen Maddox and Chad Lakin for the No. 21 spot on the Bears' all-time hits list and needs just one more to match Travis McComack in the No. 20 position
- Despite posting its worst MVC start since 2010, MSU continues to lead the Valley in nearly every major statistical category, including batting, slugging, on-base percentage, runs, walks, RBIs, home runs, triples and total bases
- Fellow freshman Hunter Steinmetz also rates among the league's overall leaders in a number of statistical categories, including league-leading totals for steals (13) and triples (7), the latter of which ranks fourth in all of Division I baseball
- The Bears have logged 47 innings in which they have scored at least three runs this season, going 23-5 in games in which they have accomplished the feat
The Missouri State Bears enter the home stretch of the Missouri Valley Conference season this weekend when they travel south to take on the league-leading Dallas Baptist Patriots in a three-game series in Dallas. The Bears and Patriots will open the weekend with a 6:30 p.m. contest Friday (May 13) at Horner Ballpark, before squaring off again Saturday (2 p.m.) and Sunday (1 p.m.) to wrap up the series.
Missouri State (27-19, 3-11 MVC) will be looking to reverse its recent fortunes in Valley action, as the Bears enter the series riding a seven-game losing streak in MVC play. MSU has been swept in back-to-back league series for the first time since late in the 2007 season, when it dropped nine straight Valley games.
Dallas Baptist (32-15, 11-3 MVC), on the other hand, brings a two-and-a-half-game lead in the MVC standings into the weekend with just six games remaining on the conference slate. Last weekend, the Patriots rebounded from their first league series defeat at Bradley by sweeping Evansville.
Dallas Baptist brings a 12-8 edge in the all-time series with MSU into this weekend's action. But that margin fails to illustrate how tight things have been between the two clubs, especially since the Patriots' move to the Valley two years ago. Over their last 12 meetings since the beginning of the 2014 season, the Bears and Patriots have seen 10 contests decided by two runs or less. Last year, each of the three games played in the series was a one-run affair, as have been eight of the last 12 and 12 of the 20 games overall in the series.
After DBU won seven of the nine games contested by the two clubs in 2014, the Bears bounced back to claim two of three from the Patriots in Springfield last April. The Bears are 4-6 in three previous series in Dallas vs. the Patriots, including the two clubs' first-ever Valley set in 2014, in which DBU claimed one-run victories in the first two contests before MSU busted out for a 10-5 win in the finale.
From Maroon and White to Stars and Stripes
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Bears All-American Jake Burger will temporarily trade his Maroon and White for Stars and Stripes this summer, as the sophomore third baseman has been invited to compete with USA Baseball's 2016 Collegiate National Team. Burger becomes the becomes the seventh Bear to be selected to compete with Team USA during head coach Keith Guttin's tenure and the second in the last three years following Tate Matheny's 2014 summer tour with the CNT.
The list of distinguished MSU standouts to compete for Team USA also includes Bill Mueller (1991), Jarrod Mays (1995), Ryan Howard (2000), Bob Zimmermann (2001-02) and Ross Detwiler (2006).
The 2016 USA Baseball Collegiate National Team will train in Fullerton, Calif. and compete against teams in the California Collegiate League from June 28-July 2, before making July trips to Chinese Taipei, Japan, and Cuba for the International Friendship Series.
Thanks in large part to Jake Burger's Division I-leading 19 home runs, the Bears continue to put up impressive power numbers with six more long balls last week. MSU has hit 60 home runs as a team this spring, which currently ranks as the 11th-best total in school history.
Burger's season total is the most for a Valley player since 2010, when Evansville's Cody Fick hit 19 homers. Spencer Johnson also went deep twice last week to hike his career-best total to 16 and move into a tie for the fourth spot on the national home run list.
| Johnson Climbing Career Charts |
With three two-hit games vs. Southern Illinois last weekend, senior outfielder Spencer Johnson made his move onto an elite list of former Bears collecting at least 200 career hits. The Springfield, Mo., native reached the milestone in MSU's 12-10 loss to SIU on Saturday (May 7), then tallied two more hits in Sunday's series finale to up his career total to 202 hits. That figure matches the career totals of Keenen Maddox and Chad Lakin in the No. 21 position on the list, just one hit behind Travis McComack for the No. 20 spot.
Johnson, who recorded the landmark hit in his 200th career game as a Bear, also ranks among MSU's all-time leaders in walks, ranking fourth on that career list with 122 free passes entering the weekend. He needs two more bases-on-balls to match Dylan Becker's career total and seven additional walks to catch Eric Cheray in the second spot on the list.
Johnson's 201 career games played is the 18th-best total in school history, just one game behind former teammates Luke Voit and Joey Hawkins, who currently share the 16th position on the chart
