FAYETTEVILLE — Tuesday starts the time frame a lot of young arms on the University of Arkansas baseball team hope to show they can be more consistent contributors to the nation’s best pitching staff.
The No. 1 Razorbacks, winners of eight games in a row, open a two-game series with San Jose State at 6 p.m. at Baum-Walker Stadium. It will start a string of seven games in nine days, the most compact stretch of games on the schedule.
The Hogs’ first two sets of two-game midweek series — against San Jose State (12-19) Tuesday and Wednesday at 3 p.m., and against Texas Tech next week — will sandwich an SEC road series at Alabama.
The pitching staff for the Razorbacks (27-3) will be put to the test more in the next nine days than it has all season. Coach Dave Van Horn said the saturated schedule will also offer a chance for bench players to get more work.
“It’s good because there’s some guys on the bench that are pulling for their teammates all weekend here and they’d rather be in the lineup playing, but they’ve done a good job of being a good teammate,” Van Horn said after Saturday’s 7-4 win over Ole Miss. “When you’re winning, you just kind of go with what’s winning and that’s kind of what we’ve done lately. But there are some guys over there on our bench and in our bullpen that are ready to go.”
The pitching plan will begin with sophomore right hander Ben Bybee (1-0, 0.00 in 4 innings) on Tuesday and freshman left-hander Colin Fisher (5-1, 2.25 ERA) targeted for Wednesday’s start.
San Jose State Coach Brad Sanfilippo said senior right-hander Keaton Chase (1-0, 8.69) will start today and he’ll sort out Wednesday’s starter after Game 1.
“He’s a low 90s [mph] guy with a curveball and change,” Sanfilippo said of Chase. “We’d like to see him be able to locate his fastball to have success. That’s maybe been part of his challenge the last few times out. He’s an older kid, mature. He didn’t throw last weekend so it’s a good opportunity for him.”
Arkansas leads Division I with a 2.63 ERA that is 0.64 better than second-place Texas A&M (3.27).
Arkansas pitchers also lead the country in strikeouts per 9 innings (13.3), strikeout-to-walk ratio (4.13) and WHIP (1.04).
Junior right-handed starter Brady Tygart is confident the seldom-used pitchers will have a chance to shine in the next seven games.
“The strength of good teams is their depth and I think we’re really going to be able to show our depth because we’ve got guys who haven’t even thrown an inning yet and in live at bats and bullpens and stuff, we’re pretty much jaw-dropped at what they’re doing,” Tygart said.
“I think any other year, they would have gotten a lot of innings. Just to add on to how [deep] our bullpen is, we’ve got guys who could be conference starters all throughout our bullpen.”
Arkansas has put on a winning clinic at its home park over the last 50 days that is unparalleled in school history. The Razorbacks will take a 21-game winning streak at Baum-Walker into the series with the Spartans of the Mountain West Conference.
The Razorbacks, whose 27-3 record is its best 30-game start in school history, have not lost at home since a 7-3 setback against James Madison on Feb. 18.
Van Horn said Saturday the fans aren’t the only ones who enjoy watching what the Razorbacks are doing on the diamond.
“It’s been fun to coach these guys and it’s fun to watch them play,” Van Horn said. “I tell them that. A lot of times, when the game starts we’re coaching, but we’re watching you play, and it’s been fun.”
Freshman infielder Nolan Souza, whose two home runs sparked the Saturday win over Ole Miss, said the huge crowds against Ole Miss were awesome.
“Just having the stadium with that energy is never a bad thing as a player,” said Souza, who was named SEC freshman of the week by the league office on Monday.
Added freshman pitcher Gabe Gaeckle, “The fans show up every game. Especially since SEC play started, they’ve started getting into the game more and there’s a lot of energy. It’s awesome playing in front of them. Hopefully, they keep coming out.”
San Jose State is coming off a three-game weekend sweep of San Diego State in conference play by a combined score of 41-10, including consecutive 17-3 routs on Friday and Saturday with no run-rule application.
“We have not obviously offensed the way that we’re capable of offensing to this point and we’re starting to get it going a little bit,” Sanfilippo said. “We haven’t done a very good job with runners in scoring position and striking out too much, just a little trying to find our way. But we’re starting to offense way better and more to our potential.”
The Spartans are led second baseman Dalton Bowling (.330, 9 home runs, 29 RBI), outfielder Robert Hamchuk (.323, 5 HR, 23 RBI), first baseman Hunter Dorraugh (.311, 6 HR, 15 RBI) and third baseman Nathan Cadena (.298, 4 HR, 24 RBI).
Outfielder Sebastian Orduno (.252, 3 HR, 23 RBI) and shortstop Theo Hardy (.241, 4 HR, 22 RBI) also have more than 20 RBI.
Bowling and Dorraugh have missed a few games with injuries but were both in the lineup for last weekend’s uprising against the Aztecs.
Sanfilippo said a three-game set at Texas last year, in which the Spartans went 1-2, was a good experience for his club, which went on to post a 0-2 record at the NCAA Stanford Regional.
“When you schedule these things, I thought we maybe had a little bit more pitching depth than we do now with injuries and things you can never account for as you go into a two-game midweek against the No. 1 team in the country,” Sanfilippo said. “I don’t know how well we’re set up with conference being so important for us. We’re just ready to compete.”