Jacks move on to Western

Friday, March 23

Macomb, Ill.

1 p.m.

South Dakota State University

Western Illinois

Photo by: Dave Eggen/Inertia Sports Media

3/22/2018 10:10:00 AM | Baseball

GAMES 20-22: South Dakota State (2-17, 0-3 Summit) at Western Illinois (3-13, 2-1)

When	1 p.m. Friday, March 23 \| 1 p.m. Saturday, March 24 \| 1 p.m. Sunday, March 25
Where	Alfred D. Boyer Stadium \| Macomb, Illinois
TV	None
Radio	None
Live Stats	GoLeathernecks.com
Series Notes	South Dakota State \| Western Illinois
Social Media	Twitter \| Facebook \| #EarnIt

The South Dakota State University baseball team will attempt to get back in the win column this weekend as it plays a three-game Summit League series at Western Illinois.

The series opener is set for 1 p.m. Friday (note time change) at Alfred D. Boyer Stadium on the WIU campus in Macomb, Illinois. Games Saturday and Sunday also are slated for 1 p.m. starts. Live stats will be available through GoLeathernecks.com.

SDSU is in the midst of its second long losing streak of the season and enters the week 2-17 overall. The Jackrabbits, who began the season on an eight-game losing streak, have lost nine in a row, including opening league play last week with three losses at defending champion Oral Roberts.

Western Illinois, meanwhile, is 3-13 overall after defeating Maryville (Mo.), 4-3, on Wednesday afternoon. The Fighting Leathernecks are 2-1 in Summit League play, however, after opening the home portion of their schedule by winning a series last weekend from North Dakota State. WIU won the opener, 2-0, on March 17, then split a March 18 doubleheader, dropping a 2-1 decision before winning the finale, 6-3.

THE SERIES: Friday's series opener will mark the 51st meeting on the baseball diamond between South Dakota State and Western Illinois. The Jackrabbits hold a 29-21 advantage in the series that dates back to 2006.

The two squads split their season series last year at three games apiece, with each team winning twice on its home field.

Western Illinois claimed the first two games of the series played April 14-15, 2017, in Macomb, winning by scores of 7-2 and 8-4. The Jackrabbits salvaged the series finale, 13-5, behind back-to-back first-inning home runs from Josh Kunzmann and Matt Johnson, as well as a five-hit performance by Nick Smith. Anthony Schneider added a home run in the third inning, while Bryce Hanson struck out eight batters in 4 1/3 innings of solid relief.

In the return series May 5-7 at SDSU's Erv Huether Field, Western Illinois again claimed the series opener, 7-5, before the Jackrabbits battled back to win the final two games. SDSU set a season high for runs in an 18-8 win in Game 2 of the series, then fended off a Western Illinois comeback for an 8-7 walkoff win in the series finale on a two-out single by Skyler Wenninger that scored Landon Badger.

PRESEASON POLL: The Jackrabbit baseball team has been picked to finish second in the upcoming Summit League race, according to a poll of league coaches released Feb. 8.

SDSU received 20 points and one first-place vote, finishing behind defending champion Oral Roberts, which received the other five first-place votes and 25 total points. North Dakota State completed the top half of the poll with 17 points.

Rounding out the second half of the poll were Western Illinois (14 points), Omaha (9) and Fort Wayne (5).

The Jackrabbits, who return six position starters, will attempt to qualify for the Summit League postseason tournament for the ninth time in 10 years. The 2018 Summit League Baseball Championship is slated for May 23-26 in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

In addition, SDSU shortstop Tony Kjolsing was selected as a Summit League Player to Watch. A senior from Chaska, Minnesota, Kjolsing batted .291 with four home runs and 21 runs batted in while playing in 32 games during the 2017 season.

SUMMIT LEAGUE SUCCESS: South Dakota State has been a consistent winner in The Summit League since it became a league member a decade ago. In 10-plus seasons as a member of The Summit League, the Jackrabbits have compiled a 148-118 (.556 winning percentage) in conference games. SDSU has posted a .500 or better record in league play seven times and has made eight appearances in the four-team postseason tournament out of the nine years it has been eligible.

The Jackrabbits shared a Summit League regular season title in 2010 and won the Summit postseason tournament in 2013.

CREIGHTON GAME POSTPONED: The Jackrabbits' game originally scheduled for March 20 at Creighton was postponed and has been rescheduled for next month. The two programs have agreed to rescheduled the game to Tuesday, April 10, with first pitch slated for 6:30 p.m. at TD Ameritrade Park in downtown Omaha.

LAST WEEKEND: The Jackrabbits battled to the bitter end, but were swept in a three-game weekend series at Oral Roberts to open Summit League play.

Game 1 Recap
Game 2 Recap
Game 3 Recap

NEW ARMS: Seven Jackrabbit pitchers made their SDSU debuts on the opening weekend of play in Missouri and Illinois. Brady Moxham and Korey Kuhlmann each started games for SDSU, while Otis Roby, Austin Suhr, Alex Marro, Bryce Johnson and Mitchell Oehme made appearances in relief.

SCHNEIDER CLEARS THE BASES: Anthony Schneider has made the most of his run-scoring opportunities during the month of March.

A senior from Altoona, Iowa, Schneider has collected only six hits this month, but has driven in 11 runs in seven games.

In a March 2-4 weekend series at Southeast Missouri Stat, Schneider plated seven runs in eight official at-bats. He began the weekend by hitting a pinch-hit grand slam in the March 2 series opener, then went 1-for-4 with a run-scoring double the next day. His grand slam was the first by a Jackrabbit player since Matt Johnson connected on April 23, 2016, at Omaha.

In the March 4 series finale, Schneider plated a first-inning run with a double and added a sacrifice fly in the sixth inning.

Schneider added to his total with four RBIs in the March 15 series opener against Oral Roberts. He connected on a three-run home run to give SDSU?a momentary 4-2 lead in the third inning, then drew a bases-loaded walk in the seventh inning to give him his second four-RBI game of the month.

KJOLSING STREAK ENDS: Shortstop Tony Kjolsing had his streak of reaching base safely by hit or walk end at 26 consecutive games in the March 9 series opener at Northern Colorado. A senior from Chaska, Minnesota, Kjolsing reached base safely in the final 14 games of the 2017 season and was on base in the first 12 games of 2018 before going 0-for-5 in an extra-innings loss to the Bears.

Kjolsing enters the weekend tied for second among base stealers in The Summit League with seven stolen bases in nine attempts.

FALK LEADS OFFENSE: Sophomore first baseman Josh Falk has been the top hitter for the Jackrabbits during the first month of the season. The Minnetonka, Minnesota, native has hit safely in 12 of the last 15 games. He is batting .316 (18-for-57) over that span with a team-best seven multi-hit games to raise his season batting average to a team-best .309.

Falk connected on his first home run as a Jackrabbit March 6 at Air Force, a game in which he also collected a season-high three runs batted in. He added a home run in the March 11 series finale at Northern Colorado.

STEIGER IN THE CLUTCH: Freshman Gus Steiger notched game-winning RBIs in back-to-back victories at Southeast Missouri State to open the month of March.

In a March 3 game, Steiger hit a two-run home run in the sixth inning to break a 2-all tie as the Jackrabbits went on to post their first win of the season, 7-4. The next day, he delivered a sacrifice fly in the top of the ninth that gave SDSU the lead in a 6-5 victory.

Steiger also plated the tying run in the top of the ninth in the March 9 series opener at Northern Colorado with a two-out single. The Jackrabbits went on to fall, 3-2, in 11 innings in their first extra-innings contest of the season.

A native of Minnetonka, Minnesota, Steiger has batted started 13 of the Jackrabbits' last 14 games at second base and batted leadoff in 11 of those contests.

JOHNSON CONNECTS TWICE: Senior infielder Newt Johnson became the first SDSU player this season to homer twice in the same game as he connected on a pair of round-trippers in the first game of a doubleheader March 17 at Oral Roberts. It was the second two-homer game of Johnson's career, with the first coming on Feb. 27, 2016, versus Virginia Commonwealth in a game played in Wilmington, North Carolina.

Prior to Johnson's two-homer game, Anthony Schneider was the last Jackrabbit to homer twice in a game — March 7, 2017, at Minnesota.

KUHLMANN IN CONTROL: Junior left-handed pitcher Korey Kuhlmann ranks third on the team with 19 innings pitched so far this season and has yet to issue a walk. Kuhlmann has made six appearances, including three starts, and recorded 12 strikeouts, including a season-high four in his Jackrabbit debut Feb. 18 versus Illinois.

COACH BISHOP: Rob Bishop, who has guided college baseball teams to more than 500 victories, was named head baseball coach at South Dakota State University on Aug. 1, 2016. Bishop is the ninth head coach in program history and the fourth in the Division I era of Jackrabbit baseball.

Overall, Bishop holds a 577-363-1 record (.614 winning percentage) as a collegiate head coach, including a 28-41 mark with the Jackrabbits. Prior to coming to SDSU, he spent six years at NCAA Division II member Montana State University-Billings, where he led the Yellowjackets to back-to-back Great Northwest Athletic Conference regular season titles in 2015 and 2016, attaining the program's first-ever 30-win season with a 30-20 record in 2016.

His squads also were honored as the top academic team in the GNAC each of his last three seasons.

Previously, Bishop spent 10 years at Miles City Community College in Montana, where his teams won MonDak conference championships every year. His squads also claimed five consecutive junior college region titles and a Northwest District championship in 2007 to advance to the NJCAA Division II College World Series. He also served as athletic director the last five years of his tenure at Miles City.

Bishop served as a graduate assistant at SDSU under head coach Mark Ekeland during the 1998 and 1999 seasons. In his first season as a head coach, Bishop led Huron University to the South Dakota Intercollegiate Conference title in 2000.

A 1994 graduate of Jamestown College, Bishop earned NAIA All-America honors during the 1992 and 1994 seasons as an infielder.

THE ROSTER: The 2018 SDSU baseball roster features 33 players from six different states and one Canadian province. Of the 33 players, 12 are from South Dakota, 10 are from Iowa and seven hail from Minnesota. Arizona, Washington and Wisconsin are represented by one player each, as is Manitoba.

By class, seven are seniors, 11 are juniors, eight are sophomores and seven are incoming freshmen.

A LOOK AHEAD: The Jackrabbits are scheduled to wrap up their string of 25 consecutive games away from home to start the season by playing a three-game Summit League series at Omaha next weekend.

The March 29 series opener is scheduled for a 4 p.m. first pitch at Isaacson Field located within Seymour Smith Park in Omaha. Games March 30 and 31 are set for respective starts of 2 p.m. and noon.

Further updates will be available through GoJacks.com and Twitter (@GoJacksBaseball).

-GoJacks.com-