Long Beach State University Athletics
Dirtbags Head to the Valley for Three
4/17/2008 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
April 17, 2008
LONG BEACH--No. 25-ranked Long Beach State (20-14, 2-4 Big West) will head to CS Northridge (15-17, 4-5 Big West) this weekend for a three-game series to begin a mini four-game road trip. The Dirtbags are coming off a 10-0 drubbing of Pepperdine on Tuesday in which Shane Peterson hit for the first known cycle in school history. The Matadors have won five of their last seven, LBSU has split their last four after a 1-9 road trip.
LBSU is 60-52 all-time against their San Fernando neighbors, and 24-15 since 1989. The Dirtbags have won five of the seven series with the Matadors since they joined the Big West in 2001.
The rotation for the series has been set with familiar Dirtbags in the starting rotation--RHP Andrew Liebel (3-2, 2.30) in the series opener on Friday at 3 p.m., followed by RHP Vance Worley (4-2, 3.77) on Saturday at 1 p.m. and freshman RHP Jake Thompson (1-4, 4.79) on Sunday at 1 p.m. Liebel has pitched into the seventh inning in each of his eight starts and leads the league in innings pitched (62.2), while Worley is not far behind in innings, with 57.1, after his second complete game of the season.
For the Matadors, RHP Davin Tate (2-0, 7.52) will start the opener, followed by RHP Phil Hann (2-3, 3.28) and RHP Billy Ott (1-2, 5.96). CSUN has a 5.84 team ERA and are batting .315. They are 11-8 in the hitter friendly Matador Field, and 4-9 away from home.
In conference play, CSUN was swept at UC Santa Barbara, swept Cal Poly at home and lost two of three at CS Fullerton last weekend.
Peterson has re-taken the lead over in batting at .362 after his four-hit and five-RBI day on Tuesday, leading the club with 36 RBIs, while OF Jason Corder is batting .351 with a conference-high nine home runs and .701 slugging percentage. Corder has also driven in 34 runs.
With one more homer, Jason Corder looks to become the first player since Evan Longoria in 2006 to hit double digits and just the second player with double digits since Jeff Jones' 10 in 2001.
