Conway, Ark.- The Warriors hosted number two ranked Birmingham-Southern College for a thrilling final weekend of regular season Southern Athletic Association (SAA) play. The three games of this weekend's series proved to be some of the most competitive, exciting action in recent memory. Going into the weekend, the Birmingham-Southern Panthers led the SAA in homeruns with 38 which also put them towards the top of all of Division-III. On the other side of the baseball, the Panthers' pitching staff had been stellar all season.
Game 1: Andrei Stoyanow took the mound for the Warriors in his fourth start of the season and put together six dominant innings allowing a mere two runs (one earned) on two hits and three walks while punching out eight Panthers. Stoyanow had his best stuff and shut down the hot bats of the Birmingham-Southern squad for six full innings. There was a momentary sigh of relief emanating from the Panthers' dugout when there was action in the Warrior bullpen, but that feeling was quickly replaced with fear and dread when John Henry Fowler took the mound. Fowler sliced and diced his way through three perfect innings in relief, notching two more strikeouts.
The Warrior bats got the job done against BSC's Joey White, hammering him for seven runs on eight hits while drawing six walks. The Warriors' scoring began in the third inning, started off by an Adam Bland two-RBI double. Before the Panthers could get out of the inning, the Warriors scored five. They would not relinquish this lead for the rest of the contest. Drake Job earned himself three more RBIs, the most of any Warrior hitter in Game 1. The Warriors took Game 1 by a score of 7-2.
Game 2: The first game of Saturday's doubleheader began with David Blackburn toeing the rubber for his tenth start of the season. A virus circulating around the Warrior pitching staff known as carveviridae which produces symptoms such as increased fastball velocity and nasty off-speed infected every member of the Warrior rotation. Through seven innings, Blackburn allowed three runs on six hits. The three runs coming in the sixth and seventh innings, at which point the Warriors already had a healthy lead which the Warrior bullpen only cemented. Cade McWilliams threw two-thirds of an inning and wound up in one of the tensest moments of the weekend: bases loaded and two outs. There was a low rumbling and the occasional pop of the catcher's mitt coming out of the Warrior bullpen, however. One name guaranteed to instill fear in even the best of hitters: Jack Hodgins. Hodgins took the ball and sat down the last four Panther hitters of the ballgame, striking out three and earning his second save of the season.
The Warriors remained hot at the plate, and secured a solid lead by scoring early, and scoring in four of eight innings. The first Warrior run came on a Rail Gilliam infield single in the first. The Warrior lineup continued to roll, plating runs in the second, third, and fifth innings. The Drix Boys plated their five runs on eight hits and seven walks. In an uncharacteristic weekend for the Panthers' pitching staff where they surrendered a handful of free passes per game in addition to some costly defensive miscues, the Warriors capitalized on the Panthers' gaffes and punished them. The Warriors took Game 2 by a score of 5-3, earning a series win and a chance to sweep an incredibly talented Birmingham-Southern team.
Game 3: Two words: Miles Schluterman. That's it. That's the write-up.
The Sophomore right-hander had a career-day on the bump for the Warriors. Schluterman went the distance in the seven-inning contest, allowing only two hits and blanking the Panthers in the runs column. Schluterman's gem is the second time this season that Birmingham-Southern has been shut out on the season. The Warrior pitching staff delivered incredible performances game-to-game, and Schluterman capped it off in fantastic form. He earned his second win of the year, with both coming against top-ten ranked teams (Birmingham-Southern and University of Wisconsin-Whitewater).
The Warriors shut down the Panther bats, owing to the entire Warrior staff having their A-plus stuff on the heels of the carveviridae outbreak. It is also of note that the Warriors did not give up the longball a single time to the Panther lineup. Warrior field is the largest ballpark in the state of Arkansas, measuring in at 410 feet to centerfield, 385 to the gaps, and 335 straight down the foul lines. Baseballs don't fly here quite like they do at Birmingham-Southern's Striplin Field which is significantly shallower in all dimensions, so the standard Panther longball at home translated into deep flyouts all weekend at Warrior Field.
Joseph Watts and Drake Job have jockeyed for the team lead in RBIs all season, and it ultimately came down to the bats of the two Warrior hitters to decide Game 3. Drake Job's first hit on the day and subsequent stolen base put him in scoring position for Watts, who drove him in with a single. This was the only run of the game for either lineup. Birmingham-Southern's Hansen McCown put together a solid outing, but the run in the first inning earned him a loss despite his solid line of six innings pitched, one earned run on three hits and a walk while striking out eight Warrior hitters. Drake Job collected two hits on McCown, and Joseph Watts' RBI single was the only other hit McCown allowed. The 1-0 win earned the Warriors their third win on the weekend, and another chance to play ball at Warrior Field, hosting postseason SAA play for the first time since 2019.
Game 1 of the SAA Opening Round will take place at Warrior Field against the Berry College Vikings at 6:00pm CDT with Game 2 to begin Saturday at 1:00pm. The games will be streamed live on the Warriors Sports Network.
