Life in the Valley

A busy Missouri Valley Conference baseball weekend is mostly in the rearview mirror now, and today’s midweek slate lies ahead. You’ll pardon the 10 Valley teams, however, if they aren’t looking ahead to the final weekend of the regular season coming in a few days. That slate will be highlighted by Indiana State’s trip to Missouri State, with the Sycamores needing just 1 win to capture the outright Valley regular-season championship.

Here’s a look at all 10 schools, how the weekend went, and what lies ahead as the regular season quite unbelievably already comes to an end. Didn’t we just start?

Indiana State (35-14, 21-3, 1st place): The Sycamores had one hiccup last week, losing 1 of 3 to Murray State. That dropped Indiana State’s RPI to 14 entering today’s game at Missouri. Still unranked in D1Baseball’s Top 25, the Sycamores play 4 games against top-75 RPI opponents to close the regular season, and they could use wins to secure a regional host position. ISU is 7-12 vs. RPI top-100 teams this season, according to D1Baseball. Meanwhile, Adam Pottinger became a social media star and earned ESPN SportsCenter’s top play during the Murray State series for this effort:

On the. mound, Connor Fenlong earned MVC Pitcher of the Week honors for his 2-hit shutout in Indiana State’s 5-0 win on Saturday. He walked 2 and struck out 3 and needed just 104 pitches, a magnificent 3.85 pitches per out. While Matt Jachec has deservedly received a lot of attention for his mound work this season, Fenlong is now 8-2 with a 3.64 ERA, 1.09 WHIP, and an opponents’ batting average of just .224. Fenlong has 3 complete-game shutouts in 12 starts, which leads the nation.

Missouri State (31-18, 18-6, 2nd): Well, the work is pretty specifically cut out for the Bears, who must sweep Indiana State this weekend to capture a share of The Valley title and the #1 seed for the conference tournament. MSU can’t’ finish lower than 2nd, but with an RPI of 65, even a sweep of Indiana State probably won’t be enough for an at-large bid unless Missouri State joins the SEC or ACC by next week. The Bears took 2 of 3 at Southern Illinois last week, and have nothing but Indiana State to focus on with no mid-week game scheduled. In the middle game vs. the Salukis, Missouri State rallied for 4 runs in the top of the 9th to send the game to extra innings, thanks to run-scoring singles from Cody Kelly, Will Duff, and Carter Bergman. Mason Hull put MSU ahead for good in the 12th with a solo homer, making a winner of Garrett Ferguson, who pitched 1-hit, shutout relief over the final 4 innings; getting 12 outs on 46 pitches (3.83 ppo).

Southern Illinois (29-23, 14-10, 3rd): Here’s where seeding for The Valley Tournament starts to get precarious, as teams look to avoid falling to 5th or 6th and having to play in the opener. The Salukis took the finale from Missouri State, 3-2, thanks in part to Steven Loden’s 18th homer of the season. If it seems like Loden has been homering every day lately, well, he almost is. He’s homered in 6 of SIU’s last 9 games with 14 RBIs, giving him 54 for the season. The junior from Lower Gwynedd, Pa., is slugging .580, but has almost homered more than he’s struck out (20) this season. SIU also has no mid-week game to contend with, but will travel to Murray State this weekend. The Racers, 6th in The Valley by tiebreaker with UIC, are only 2 games behind SIU in the standings, part of a crowded 4-team battle for the 3rd and 4th seeds that also includes 4th-place Evansville, whom SIU has a tiebreaker over. Two wins this weekend would lock the Salukis into the 3-seed next week. Getting swept, however, could drop SIU all the way to 6th.

Evansville (31-20, 13-11, 4th): Unlike other Valley teams, UE is getting a tough test tonight when the Purple Aces visit Indiana. Then, it’s off to Chicago for 3 at surging UIC to close the season. Having dropped 2 of 3 to SIU earlier (frustratingly so for the Purple Aces, given they rolled in Game 1), UE must win its series and hope to go 2 games better than SIU’s result to finish 3rd. UE would win a potential tiebreaker with Murray State. UE took 2 of 3 from Bradley over the weekend, winning the finale 7-2 thanks to homers from Chase Hug and Ty Rumsey, and a unique outing for Eric Roberts, who tripled, stole a base, and pitched a scoreless inning. Roberts, who has 17 HRs, 51 RBIs, and a 1.011 OPS, also has a save and has thrown 6 2/3 scoreless innings, allowing just 2 hits, 1 walk, and striking out 4. His WHIP is 0.45. Opposing hitters are batting .095 against Roberts, a graduate student from Hamilton, Ohio. In 49 career innings, Roberts has never allowed a homer, while he’s hit 28 in his career.

UIC (26-21, 12-12, 5th): Speaking of the Flames, 2 weeks ago there wouldn’t have been much talk about UIC earning a top-4 spot in The Valley Tournament. But a 7-game winning streak, including sweeps of Belmont and Illinois State sandwiched around a victory vs. Purdue, has brightened UIC’s future. Charlie Szykowny continues to lead the offensive charge for the Flames, sporting team-bests in average (.335), homers (16), and RBIs (52). His OPS has vaulted to 1.113. Earlier this season, Szykowny put together a 13-game hitting streak in which he hit .377 with 4 HRs and 16 RBIs. The Wisconsin-Stout grad transfer homered twice in UIC’s sweep of the Redbirds last weekend. UIC plays Iowa tonight before hosting UE this weekend. UIC needs wins and help to ascend in tournament seeding. The Flames won their series with Murray State, 2-1, but were swept by SIU.

Murray State (27-25, 12-12, 6th): The Racers, who were to take on Bellarmine today but lost that game due to weather, now have just their regular-season ending series at home vs. Southern Illinois to look forward to. The best Murray can do is finish 15-12 and hope for the best, though the Racers lose tiebreakers to UE and UIC, and unfortunate scheduling for Murray sees those two playing each other this weekend. Murray took 1 each of 3 in recent conference series vs. leaders Indiana State and Missouri State. In the 12-5 win over the Sycamores, Logan Bland had 3 hits and 3 RBIs, while hitting 1 of Murray State’s 4 homers. The Racers roughed up ISU ace Matt Jachec for 7 runs on 10 hits in just 4 innings. while Matt Boynton pitched 4 innings and allowed just 1 unearned run to get the win.

Valparaiso (19-21, 9-15, 7th): The Beacons are coming off a tough series loss to Belmont, where Valpo fell twice after taking the opener convincingly, 12-3. Alex Ryan scored 4 runs in the win, while Kyle Schmack and Ryan Maka each drove in 3. Griffin McCluskey was a machine, striking out 11 Bruins in 8 innings to get the victory. He now has 65 strikeouts in 62 2/3 innings this season. Valpo hosts 9th-place Illinois State this weekend, while 8th-place Belmont takes on 10th-place Bradley. The teams finishing 9th and 10th will see their season ends without conference tournament baseball (don’t get me started), but entering the weekend, all 4 teams are within 3 games of each other, so much like the teams packed in 3rd through 6th places, the carnage potential is high, and there should be a good bit of switching feeds back and forth on ESPN+ this weekend.

Belmont (23-29, 8-16, 8th): This isn’t the position the Bruins expected to be in going into the final weekend when they were 5-1 and part of a tie at the top of The Valley standings. But Belmont has fallen on hard times since, going 3-15 in the league. But the Bruins ended a 5-series conference losing skid by taking 2 of 3 from Valpo last weekend, winning by scores of 13-3 and 5-1. Mason Landers doubled twice and had 4 RBIs in the 13-3 victory. In the finale, Landers and Sam Slaughter homered, while Andy Bean combined with relievers Simon Tesh and Ethan Harden to close out the win. The trio gave up 1 run on 7 hits with 1 walk and 6 strikeouts, on a combined 116 pitches. If my math is right, Belmont needs 2 wins this weekend to play in the conference tournament.

Illinois State (18-29, 7-17, 9th): One game out of 8th and the final transfer position sit the Redbirds, who have lost 6 of their last 7 and were swept last weekend by UIC. But at the end of April, Illinois State surprised Southern Illinois by taking 2 of 3, which has given the Redbirds life as they head to Valpo this weekend. Illinois State will make the conference tournament if it sweeps the Beacons. Two wins leave the Redbirds 9-18, meaning Illinois State would need Bradley to sweep Belmont to get to 9-18, with the Redbirds owning the head-to-head tiebreaker for what would be the 8th spot. Going into the final weekend, catcher Nick Strong has 161 straight errorless defensive chances.

Bradley (15-30, 6-18, 10th): All is not lost for fans near the Illinois River, as Bradley still has a path to the conference tournament, though the road won’t be easy. The Braves have to sweep Belmont this weekend, nothing else will do, then hope Valpo wins at least 2 of 3 from Illinois State. That would leave the Beacons as the 7-seed at 11-16, while Bradley would end up 9-18, 1 game ahead of Belmont and at least 1 game ahead of the Redbirds. A potential 9-18 tie for 8th with Valpo does the Braves no good, as Valpo swept their head-to-head series. Either way, something else to watch for the Braves is the hitting of Nick Vogel, who with no mid-week game, enters the Belmont series hitting .379. A 9-for-13 performance at the plate this weekend would leave Vogel right at .400 for the season, and potentially carry the Braves to Terre Haute next week.

(RPI information available at D1Baseball.com. Statistical information found on the team websites.)