Tigers tune up for conference play

Team says anything can happen in conference series against Longhorns.

By Evan Glantz

Published March 13, 2009

In their 2009 NCAA preseason rankings, Baseball America placed the Missouri Tigers baseball team No. 10, just behind conference rival Texas, who came in at No. 4. Since then, the Longhorns have jumped to the No. 1 in the poll, while a rough start dropped the Tigers out of the Top 25. The teams meet up for Missouri's first conference series tonight in Austin, Texas.

But before Missouri could head south, it had a tune-up with the Western Illinois Leathernecks. The Tigers took control early, and a 10-run fourth inning sealed an 18-4 victory. With four wins in its past five games, Missouri has built some confidence before traveling to Austin.

"A lot of guys are swinging the bats better than they were at the beginning of the year," junior right fielder Aaron Senne said. "So just that confidence boost for each person's morale individually is going to be big."

After struggling this season offensively, the Tigers charged the Leathernecks right off the bat. Missouri led off the bottom of the first with five straight hits against WIU junior starting pitcher Austin Brough. Overall Missouri sent all nine batters to the plate in the inning, the first of three times they would do that Tuesday night.

"I thought this was the best we've swung the bats, maybe all year," coach Tim Jamieson said. "And that's a big lift for them because that's the biggest area of concern."

Even with the boost of confidence, winning in Austin will not be easy. The Longhorns are sure to remember the drubbing they received last year in Columbia when the Tigers handled them 31-12.

Texas will be even more potent this year. Coming into Tuesday, the Longhorns were 12-1 and sitting atop the Big 12 with their only loss coming to No. 17 Stanford. As a team, Texas is hitting .296 and its pitchers are cruising with a 1.35 team earned run average. But the Tigers are looking past those stats.

"We're going to go down there and battle," junior catcher Trevor Coleman said. "We're going to do the same thing we've done all year, and the same thing we've been taught to do. And that is to have a quality approach, be aggressive, get pitches to hit and battle with two strikes. Those are the fundamentals of Missouri baseball."

The fundamentals will play a big part in the Tigers' performance at Texas.

"We've got to minimize our mistakes, whether it be on the bases, defensively, bad at bats or whatever it happens to be," Jamieson said. "If we play our best, I'll take our chances against anybody. But if we make mistakes, it's going to be a long weekend."

Overall, Missouri is looking forward to the fresh start and fresh competition conference play provides. With the rough patch behind them, the Tigers will look to knock off tough conference rivals.

"Anything can happen. It's conference baseball," Coleman said. "I don't care what the records are, where you're playing, I don't care. Anything can happen."