Southern Illinoise University Athletics
Baseball Host Creighton In MVC Play This Weekend
03/27/2002 | 12:00:00 | Baseball
March 27, 2002
Carbondale, Ill. -
Complete Release in PDF Format
Download Free Acrobat Reader
Southern Illinois University (13-6, 2-2 MVC) will be home for the second straight weekend, when it hosts Creighton (8-9, 2-1 MVC) March 29-31 in a four-game Missouri Valley Conference series this weekend at Abe Martin Field.
"Even though we beat Creighton 10-3 (Mar. 15) at the Irish Classic in Texas, I think the game was much closer than the score. They may be fastest team in the MVC and they have some very good players. We're going to have our hands full in this series and they will put pressure us on defense," Dan Callahan, Saluki head coach stated.
"When you play at home, and as competitive as this league is, you have to try win every series. That has to be your mindset every week at home and on the road. You can't go in looking for a split and you really need to win as many at home as you can due to the balance in the MVC."
SIU opened MVC play with a 2-2 series split versus Bradley University last weekend at Abe Martin Field.
"I hope we learned something last weekend. I think we went into the Bradley series thinking it would be easy since they were picked to finish last in the league," added Callahan.
Callahan will have to rely on his young pitchers more this week than any time the whole season due to sophomore Jerel Deitering (4-1) skipping a start due to a sore arm.
"We're going to try some younger guys. Ryan Welch (1-1) will start and we'll look for another starter for the weekend with Deitering out of the mix, maybe another underclassman like Josh Joiner. We'll try to keep Eric Haberer available for multiple performances and see how things go on Friday," said Callahan.
The Salukis will play a single game on Friday at 1 p.m., a doubleheader on Saturday at 12 p.m. and a single game on Sunday at 1 p.m. against the Bluejays.
