SUPER 1 FOODS CONFERENCE USA TOURNAMENT | JC love Field (Ruston La.)
ROUND 1
No. 4 Sam Houston (33-22, 13-11 CUSA) vs No. 5 Liberty (22-32, 11-13 CUSA)
Projected Starters
SHSU: RHP Coltin Atkinson (6-4, 3.62 ERA, 79.2 IP, 73 K, 19 BB)
LIB: RHP Cole Hertzler (5-7, 4.68 ERA, 82.2 IP, 95 K, 34 BB)
ROUND 2
No. 1 LA Tech (41-15, 18-6 CUSA) or No. 8 Middle Tennessee (8-16, 20-34 CUSA)
Friday, May 17 | 6:30 PM
Projected Starters
SHSU: LHP Michael Watson (6-1, 3.88 ERA, 65.0 IP, 84 K, 24 BB)
LA TECH or MTSU: TBA
RUSTON, La. – The second season will kick off for the Sam Houston Bearkats this week in the Super 1 Foods CUSA Tournament, starting Wednesday in the opening round vs Liberty.
All games will take place at JC Love Field at Pat Patterson Park on the campus of Louisiana Tech.
The Kats enter the weekend as the No. 4 seed and will battle the No. 5 Flames in the first game of the double-elimination portion of the event. Sam Houston and Liberty are joined by top-seeded Louisiana Tech and No. 8 Middle Tennessee on its side of the bracket.
Fans can listen to Carlos Zimmermann on the call for each game of the Kats journey in the CUSA Tournament on the Bearkat Sports Network, Bearkat Sports app and BSN+.
Each game of the double-elimination portion of the week can also be watched on ESPN+, while Sunday's championship game will be aired nationally on CBS Sports Network.
Liberty swept the Kats in their regular-season meeting in Lynchburg in late March, but the teams come to Ruston heading in different directions. Sam Houston is the hottest team in the league and has won nine of its last 10 games, including sweeps in each of its last three weekends. Meanwhile the Flames have dropped their last six games, albeit to the two top seeds in the tournament – Dallas Baptist and Louisiana Tech.
QUICK HITTERS
- Michael Watson has 84 strikeouts in 2024, which is most strikeouts by a Bearkats since Hayden Wesneski had 110 in 2019.
- The Kats need 4 more steals to reach 100 swipes in consecutive years for the first time since the 1986 and 1987 seasons.
- The Bearkats have won 133 total games since the beginning of the 2021 season. Of teams in CUSA, only Dallas Baptist (162) and Louisiana Tech (154) have won more.
- Easton Loyd will be playing in his 200th career game in the tournament opener vs Liberty.
BEARKAT QUICK HITTERS
- The Kats raked in their fair share of postseason honors from Conference USA on Tuesday, led by Walker Janek's selection as the league's Defensive Player of the Year and as a first-team catcher. Starting pitcher Coltin Atkinson was named to the First Team, while Michael Watson (SP) and Chandler David (RP) each made the second team. Additionally, Ryan Peterson and Jace Martinez were each named to the league's All-Freshman squad.
- Jeffrey David enters Thursday with a team-best, 26-game hitting streak and has reached in 30 games overall. It is the longest hit streak by a Kat this year, along with the 23-gamer put together by Walker Janek to open the season. That mark is tied with Chris Andreas' 26-game hit streak in 2010 as the second-longest in program history. The school record hit streak was set by Terry Pirtle who hit safely in 34 consecutive games in 1987.
- During the streak he is hitting at a .416 clip with 42 hits, six doubles, a homer and 25 RBI. David has struck out just 16 times and walked 10 times in 115 total plate appearances.
- David's streak is the longest active hit streak in CUSA entering this week's tournament, and the longest by a CUSA player this season. The Kats and Middle Tennessee are the only teams within the league to have multiple players with hit streaks of 20+ games.
- Walker Janek has racked up the accolades in 2024, and justifiably so. He has been named to watch lists for both the Buster Posey Award and the Dick Howser Trophy, but his most recent nod came on Monday when he was named as 1 of 25 semifinalists for the Golden Spikes Award, given out by USA Baseball.
- It is the third time the Bearkats have had a semifinalist for the Golden Spikes Award, all coming since 2021. Colton Cowser was the first Kat to get the honor, doing so in 2021 before he was selected No. 5 overall in the MLB Draft. One year later Carlos Contreras was named a semifinalist in a 2022 season which saw him win WAC Player of the Year honors and finish second in the nation with 89 RBI.
- Janek was tabbed by MLB Pipeline and draft expert Jim Callis as the No. 25 prospect for July's MLB Draft in its latest rankings, up 23 spots from his No. 48 ranking prior to the year. He is putting together his best season at the college level, ranking in the top 5 in CUSA in batting average (.381), home runs (17), triples (5) and runs scored (52). Defensively, Janek has thrown out 15 of 29 attempted base stealers this season and is doing it at the plate as well.
- As good as Janek has been against the run game, the Kats have been just as good when running. Sam Houston has swiped 96 bags this year while allowing just 23 steals. The Kats are the only team in CUSA to have 4 players with at least a dozen swipes this year, the first time that has happened in recorded SHSU history.
- The Kats enter the weekend with 20 triples, a total which leads CUSA and ranks 12th in the country. On the pitching side Sam Houston is issuing just 3.03 walks per 9 innings, a mark which also leads CUSA and ranks fifth in the nation.
POSTSEASON NEED-TO-KNOWS
- The Bearkats will enter their first CUSA Tournament in search of the program's 13th berth in an NCAA Regional. Sam Houston was the No. 3 seed in the 2023 NCAA Baton Rouge Regional after claiming the WAC Tournament as the No. 2 seed by winning 4 straight elimination games in 2 days, scoring 72 total runs games vs Grand Canyon, Abilene Christian and Utah Valley.
- Overall, Sam Houston has won 7 conference tournaments in its history since becoming a Division I program in 1987. The Kats won 6 Southland Tournaments (1996, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2016, 2017) and 1 (2023) in the WAC.
- The 8-team, double-elimination format is not one which is unfamiliar for the Kats as it was the standard bracket style in the SLC from 2008 through 2021. The Kats enter this week as the No. 4 seed in the tournament, a spot which las lent well to the Kats in the past as they won SLC Tournament crowns in both 2007 and 2008 as the No. 4 seed.
- Despite being in its first year in CUSA, the Kats will still be looking to win a league tournament for the second straight season. The last time SHSU won consecutive league tournaments came in the Southland Conference when the Kats won consecutive SLC Tournament crowns in 2016 and 2017.
- Those tournament wins also mark the last time the Kats qualified for consecutive NCAA Regionals. The 2016 season saw the Kats become the first team in Southland Conference history to win both the regular season and tournament crowns, earning a berth in the Lafayette Regional where they fell twice to eventual national runner-up Arizona.
- A year later the Kats swept their way through the Southland Tournament and stayed hot, becoming the league's first program to win a regional when they won 3 elimination games in a span of 24 hours to eliminate Arizona and the No. 6 overall seed Texas Tech for the Lubbock Regional crown. The Kats moved on to the Tallahassee Super Regional where they fell to Florida State, 2 wins shy of Omaha.
- The Kats come into Ruston with a 33-22 record, having secured another winning season. Excluding the COVID-shortened 2020 season, this year is the 13th consecutive season with a winning record for Sam Houston who has not put up a losing mark since going 19-36 in 2010. That streak is the longest among teams in CUSA, and is second only Texas A&M (17) among the 17 schools within the state of Texas playing Division I baseball.
