Starting 9
1) Missouri State (2-4) wraps up a season-opening seven-game road trip Tuesday at 3 p.m. against Oral Roberts (4-2) before coming home to Hammons Field for a series against ULM (4-2). Game times against the Warhawks are 3 p.m. Friday, Feb. 28, 2 p.m. Saturday, March 1 and 1 p.m. Sunday.
2) For the first time since 1983, the Bears have a new coach.
Joey Hawkins, who played for the Bears from 2012-15 and served as assistant coach from 2022-24, is just the third head coach in program history. Bill Rowe managed the Bears from 1964-82 before becoming the school's athletic director. Keith Guttin, who played for MSU under Rowe, succeeded him in 1983 before retiring after the 2024 campaign.
   In their respective first seasons, Rowe went 6-12 overall in 1964, while Guttin's 1983 club went 32-11 and led the nation with a .367 batting average.
3) The Bears are 32-35 all-time against ORU with a 17-21 record in Tulsa. Missouri State has been victorious in eight of its last nine games at Chapman Park. MoState is 5-3 against ULM after winning two of three in a season-opening series in Monroe last year.
4) The Bears have homered in 113 of the last 137 games, and rank 14th nationally with 316 long balls since the beginning of the 2022 season, when Hawkins took over as hitting coach. MoState's 114 homers last season ranked second in school and fourth in MVC history.
5) Zack Stewart (33),
Caden Bogenpohl (21),
Taeg Gollert (21) and
Nick Rodriguez (21) all have at least 20 homers in their MSU careers, and the current roster has combined for 116 round-trippers in their time at MoState.
6) Through two weeks, Missouri State's pitching staff leads the MVC and ranks 19th nationally with 12.1 strikeouts per nine innings. The Bears' 2.48 K/BB ratio sits second in the conference and 72nd in the NCAA, and the Bears have struck out at least eight hitters in every game this season.
7) Four former Freshman All-Americans are on the MSU roster.
Nick Rodriguez received the honor in 2022 at Charleston Southern,
Garrett Ferguson and
Zack Stewart each landed on multiple such teams for MSU in 2023, and
Caden Bogenpohl did the same last year for the Bears.
8) D1Baseball tabbed the Bears as the favorite to win the MVC this season, with sophomore
Caden Bogenpohl as its preseason player of the year and
Michael Yusypchuk as its freshman of the year. The MVC will release its preseason poll and all-conference teams on March 17 entering the first weekend of league play.
9) The 2025 season will be Missouri State's 35th and final year in the MVC. The university accepted an invitation to Conference USA on May 10, 2024, and will officially join that league on July 1, 2025. The baseball Bears own the most league wins (471) and highest MVC winning percentage (.581) of any current league school with six regular season championships and five tournament titles in 34 seasons.
