The Eastern New Mexico baseball team will head to Kingsville, Texas for the final series of the 2019 season against Texas A&M-Kingsville.

The series is set for four games over the weekend at Nolan Ryan Field beginning at 5 p.m. MST on Friday night. The teams will come back out for the traditional Saturday doubleheader beginning at noon MST and will cap off the series with the same starting time on Sunday afternoon.

The Greyhounds enter the series one game back of Tarleton State for the sixth and final spot in the 2019 Lone Star Conference Postseason Tournament with a record of 3-17 in conference play. Eastern New Mexico kept themselves in playoff contention last weekend by splitting the series 2-2 against Tarleton State at Greyhound Field and will need to find a way to defeat a Texas A&M-Kingsville ball club that enters the weekend with a record of 12-5 on their home field.

Eastern and Texas A&M-Kingsville met in a series designated as a non-conference affair back on Mar. 15-17 at Greyhound Field, a series in which the Javelinas won three games to one. All eyes will be on the Greyhounds as well as the Tarleton State series against UT-Permian Basin, as all other teams in the Lone Star Conference have secured their spot in the 2019 postseason tournament.

LAST TIME OUT
Eastern New Mexico salvaged a 2-2 series split after a tale of two games in the first two meetings between the two teams on Friday night and Saturday afternoon. Redshirt freshman Ethan Coombes threw seven innings without conceding an earned run on Friday night, but suffered the loss as the Texans took advantage of a throwing error by the Greyhound defense to put across the first run of the night for either team in the top of the seventh.

Tarleton tacked on one more run in the top of the ninth before the Greyhounds attempted to mount the comeback while trailing 2-0 entering the final frame. Senior Eurick Perez doubled down the left field line to leadoff the inning and was eventually driven in by classmate Chris Padilla to cut the deficit in half and give the Greyhounds a chance with the tying run stepping to the plate, but couldn’t manage anymore offense to force extra innings.

Game number two of the series couldn’t have been any different for the two teams as they combined to total 33 hits and 34 runs in a 21-13 win for Tarleton State to take the 2-0 advantage in the series. Despite suffering the loss, that offensive performance kick started the Hounds for the rest of the series and pushed them ahead 7-3 after the first two frames in game number three on Saturday afternoon.

Senior Enrique Perez cruised to his fifth win of the season in his final start at Greyhound Field after pitching 5.1 innings while striking out eight batters along the way. Fellow senior Nicholas Ankerman went 3-for-4 with two RBI’s and three runs scored in the contest, and was later named the Lone Star Conference Hitter of the Week for his efforts in the series.

Eastern continued to battle into game number four on Sunday afternoon and pulled off a thrilling 9-8 victory over the Texans despite squandering a 7-4 lead in the top of the eighth inning. Trailing 8-7 following a four-run top half of the eighth inning for the Texans, junior Ryan Anderson played the role of hero and knocked in Joel Paulino and Paul Tapia for the tying and go-ahead runs in the bottom of the eighth inning. Senior Cesar Capellan then shut down the Texan offense in the top of the ninth to secure the 9-8 win for the Hounds and the 2-2 series split.

SCOUTING THE JAVELINAS
Texas A&M-Kingsville enters the weekend with an overall record of 25-19 and sits in fourth place with a record of 9-11 in Lone Star Conference play. The Javelinas are coming off of an 0-4 series sweep at the hands of #1 Angelo State last weekend on the road and are currently riding a six game losing streak dating back to a 2-2 series split against UT-Permian Basin. Texas A&M-Kingsville will be returning to their home field for the first time in the three weeks after playing their last two series on the road and have won both their conference series 3-1 on their home turf throughout the conference schedule.

The Javelinas rank third in both batting and pitching this season in the LSC with a team batting average of .296 and a team ERA of 4.74. Junior Seth Spinn ranks fourth in the league with a batting average of .384 for the year and fourth in the league with 21 stolen bases for the season while sophomore Giancarlo Servin leads the team with 39 RBI’s on the season.

The pitching staff for Texas A&M-Kingsville will continue to be led by the one-two punch of starting pitchers Zach Boyett and Preston Planovich, who have combined for 21 starts and have recorded ERA’s of 2.98 and 3.67 thus far.

HISTORY WITH THE JAVELINAS
Eastern New Mexico is now 32-86 all-time against Texas A&M-Kingsville after dropping three of four to the Javelinas earlier this year. The Greyhounds have won just nine games in 52 attempts in Kingsville, Texas, the last of which came back on April 19, 2014.

Eastern has never won back-to-back games against Texas A&M-Kingsville on their home field.

THE ANKER HAD OFFICIALLY LANDED
Senior Nicholas Ankerman made his final series at Greyhound Field count last weekend and was named the Lone Star Conference Hitter of the Week after batting .571 for the series against Tarleton State. The Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada native went 8-for-14 from the plate and recorded two doubles, a triple and a homerun throughout the weekend for a slugging percentage of 1.071.

He scored a team-high eight runs throughout the series and now ranks as the team leader in batting average (.360), runs (34), RBI’s (29), on-base percentage (.486) and slugging percentage (.515).

THE FEARSOME FOURSOME
Seniors Nicholas Ankerman, Eurick Perez, Chris Padilla and Malcolm Boehm made their final home series a memorable one last weekend against Tarleton State and have taken their game to the next level in an attempt to qualify for the LSC Postseason Tournament in their final season as Greyhounds. The four Hounds combined to go 24-for-50 from the plate and all posted batting averages above .350 for the weekend.

They combined to record nine extra-base hits and accounted for 18 of the 32 runs scored for Eastern over the weekend.

IT’S ALL ABOUT THE RIGHT TIME
Timely hitting is never more important than when a team’s back is against the wall, and the Greyhounds made the most of their opportunities over the weekend. The Hounds hit .327 (16-for-49) with runners in scoring position over the weekend, a steep improvement over their season average which currently sits at .285.

Eastern New Mexico also managed to extend innings with two outs throughout the weekend, going 15-for-47 for an average of .329 with two outs in the four games. The Greyhounds have posted a .287 mark for the season when there are two outs on the board, and will need to be able to manufacture offense with two down against a talented pitching staff from Texas A&M-Kingsville this weekend.