By Cody Stark
The field is set for the Southland Conference baseball tournament, it’s just a matter of who is playing who now.
Texas State (22-6 in SLC, 36-12 overall) has already wrapped up the regular-season championship and the top seed for the tournament, which will be held May 20-23 at Whataburger Field in Corpus Christi. After that, the second through eight seeds will be determined this weekend as the regular season comes to a close.
Sam Houston State (30-21) is currently in seventh place at 16-13, a game behind Northwestern State (15-12, 23-23) and well ahead of eight-place Stephen F. Austin (13-15, 22-26).
The Bearkats host last-place Texas A&M-Corpus; Christi (8-21, 17-35) in a three-game series beginning today at 6:30 p.m. and could finish the season anywhere from second to eighth depending on the outcome of games around the league this weekend.
“The seeding in our conference is kind of a weird deal, but the big thing for us is to build some momentum. We need to play well,” SHSU head coach Mark Johnson said Wednesday. “We finish finals tomorrow, so everybody will be through and can put all their focus on baseball. You could end up getting good seeding, but the big thing is to get momentum.”
A lot needs to happen for the Bearkats to move up. Southeastern Louisiana is in second at 19-10 and travels to face Northwestern State. Texas-Arlington (18-11, 28-22) is third and Lamar (17-12, 33-19) and Texas-San Antonio (17-12, 28-21) are tied for fourth.
Several teams could help out Sam Houston State. Texas State is at UTA, Southeastern Louisiana is at Northwestern State, Lamar is at SFA and UTSA hosts Central Arkansas.
Second place is probably out of reach for the Bearkats because they would have to sweep and have the Lions lose three to the Demons. But Southeastern holds the tiebreaker after sweeping Sam Houston a couple of weeks ago.
The Kats could move into third if UTA drops two of three to the Bobcats and that could very well happen. Texas State would also like to carry some momentum into the tournament.
There is so much that could happen, but what it basically comes down to is that Sam Houston has to win its series and have SFA, Central Arkansas, Texas State and Southeastern Louisiana do the same to move up.
But the Bearkats are going to need to get things rolling on offense. At the beginning of the season the Sam Houston bats carried the load. Now, the Kats are getting quality starts from freshman Sean Weatherford, senior Jacob Howard and sophomore Brent Powers with the production at the plate slipping.
“We have been in a little bit of a slump the last few weeks and I don’t know where it came from,” Johnson said. “We aren’t going to do anything in the conference tournament if we don’t get some momentum. The pitchers on a whole have given us great chances in the second half of the season. We just need to get the offense going like it was early on.”
The Bearkats probably wouldn’t mind to get in as the fourth seed because it has paid off the past two seasons. Sam Houston has won back-to-back SLC tournaments in the fourth spot.
But Johnson isn’t concerned with the seeding right now. He just wants the Bearkats to get on a roll this weekend.
“We have talked mainly about getting our game together,” the coach added. “It is really us that I have my focus on. It doesn’t matter who we are playing, we need to get our game going.”
