Starting 9
1) Missouri State (11-12, 3-0 Missouri Valley Conference) is home for the next four games, beginning with a three-game MVC series against Belmont (9-17, 1-2). Game times are 6:30 p.m. Friday, 2 p.m. Saturday and 1 p.m. Sunday.
    The Bears are off to a 3-0 MVC start for the first time since 2017, when they won their first 18 league games, and enter the series on an offensive hot streak, averaging 13.5 runs in the last four games and scoring in 16 of their last 20 offensive innings.
    After the Belmont series, MoState hosts Oklahoma State at 6:30 p.m. on April 1, the second game in a stretch of seven consecutive Tuesday contests against Power Four opponents.
2) MoState is 5-4 against Belmont with a 3-0 record against the Bruins at Hammons Field. In BU's last visit to Springfield, the Bears won 17-5, 5-1 and 6-1. Belmont took three of four last season.
3) The Bears have homered in 125 of the last 154 games, and rank 12th nationally with 352 long balls since the beginning of the 2022 season, when first-year head coach
Joey Hawkins took over as hitting coach. MoState's 114 homers last season ranked second in school and fourth in MVC history.
4) Zack Stewart (37),
Caden Bogenpohl (23),
Taeg Gollert (23) and
Nick Rodriguez (23) all have at least 23 homers in their MSU careers, and the current roster has combined for 152 round-trippers in their time at MoState.
5) Missouri State's pitching staff leads the MVC and ranks 43rd nationally with 10.0 strikeouts per nine innings. The Bears' 2.32 K/BB ratio also leads the Valley and ranks 58th nationally, and the Bears have struck out at least seven hitters in all but three games this season.
  Â
Michael Yusypchuk and
Jackson Holmes have earned MVC Pitcher of the Week honors this season, while
Tyler Charlton (2nd - 36), Holmes (3rd - 35), Yusypchuk (4th - 34) and Holmes are all in the top four in strikeouts.
6) Several Bears are climbing MSU career charts, while another stands out as a rarity in college baseball this season.
Taeg Gollert currently sits 13th in school history with 47 career doubles and 18th with 71 extra-base hits.
Zack Stewart is 11th on career homers (37) and 18th with 71 extra-base hits.
Nick Rodriguez ranks 15th in MoState history with 91 career walks.
Max Knight, meanwhile, is one of two Division I players (Tulane's Michael Lombardi) with at least 10 pitching appearances and 20 RBIs.
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 coaches poll was released on March 17 and also tabs the Bears to win, with Bogenpohl and
Nick Rodriguez earning all-MVC honors.
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 (474) and highest MVC winning percentage (.582) of any current league school with six regular season championships and five tournament titles in 34 seasons.
