SHAWNEE – For the third time this season, Oklahoma Baptist and Central Oklahoma will square off. On April 19 at 5 p.m. the squads will play a single game at Wendell Simmons Field.
The Bronchos have won the previous two matchups by 8-7 and 11-3 scores. UCO's pitching has made a real difference in those games. In 20.2 innings pitched, the Bronchos have held the potent Bison attack to a .192 average and only three multi-base hits in 78 at-bats.
OBU (20-18) is coming off a strong weekend performance against No. 9 Southern Arkansas. Despite dropping two of three, the Bison got solid pitching and nearly came away with a season-defining series win.
As a staff, a 4.68 ERA was produced with
Bo Dallas,
Brek Galbreath and
Jake Hamilton all recording at least 10 strikeouts.
Dan Pruitt led the way offensively with an impressive .692 average and 1.385 slugging percentage. Pruitt also hit two homers and boosted his total to 19. That is one off the program's D2 single-season record set in 2019 by Jake Gozzo (20).
Collectively, the Bison's offense fared well against strong SAU pitching by notching a .337 mark. OBU also ran its nation-leading home run total to 91, which tied the program's D2 single-season record set in 2019.
This year, six different players have above .308 batting averages:
Ramon Gomez,
Jose Parga,
Alex Schroeder,
Walker Keller,
Kade Self and Pruitt.
UCO (24-16) has won six of its last nine contests after defeating Northwestern Missouri 4-1 on April 16.
Clayton Peterson and Garrett Takamatsu have led the Bronchos' offense this year. Peterson has notched 10 doubles and 41 RBI while Takamatsu has recorded 14 homers and 41 runs batted in. During the two previous games, each player combined to hit at least .429 against OBU pitching.
Collectively this year, nine players have registered at least a .300 batting average.
On the mound, Lawson Isaacs and Jacob Bailey got the starts in the two previous contests. In all, UCO used eight pitchers and posted a 4.29 ERA and allowed eight earned runs in 21 innings.
This season, Tucker Elliott has led Central Oklahoma with 66 strikeouts while Bailey has notched 65. Kyler Patterson has the team's best ERA at 0.53.
