Bods tied for fourth in MIAA

Chris Marshall

The WU baseball squad had its travel plans to MWSU altered over Spring Break. Rain and snow continues to shake up the Ichabods’ schedule and a pair of weekend double headers were pushed to Tuesday and today.

Provided the weather, which has cancelled nine of WU’s games this season, stays baseball-friendly, the Bods will play the second of two double headers against the Griffons (9-8, 4-8 MIAA) at 4 p.m. today.

Although unexpected snow in March has left WU with an off-and-on schedule, when the Bods (9-5, 6-4) were able to take the field over Spring Break, they performed to expectations.

“We’re playing better offensively and defensively,” said senior Wes Joy. “We’ve been able to put up a lot of runs by coming out and just putting it on people and I think our pitching’s gotten better also.”

The Bods climbed into a tie for fourth in the MIAA with a schedule consisting of Truman State, Southwest Baptist and Pittsburg State, teams that were picked in the preseason to finish in the last three spots of the conference standings.

WU won three of four home games against TSU on March 14 and 15 to move above-.500 in the standings. The Bulldogs are the MIAA’s last-place team, but the wins give WU confidence heading into a tougher stretch of the conference schedule.

“It’s nice starting with some of the lower-tier teams since we didn’t get as much of a non-conference schedule with the weather and everything,” Joy said. “We got a chance to get our feet wet and pick up some good conference wins.”

After sweeping a double header against the Bulldogs on March 14 with 8-7 and 7-1 wins, the Bods dropped game one 10-2 on March 15. In the fourth game, WU bounced back with an 11-4 win and extended its season-long streak of not getting swept by an opponent. With 3-1 series victories against TSU and SBU, and a 2-2 split with PSU, the Bods like where they’re sitting, but aren’t satisfied yet.

“We’d like to get up in the top two spots of the conference standings, but being in the top four is big for us,” Joy said. “The top six make the postseason so we’d like to stay about where we are and make sure we get in this year.”

WU wrapped up a 10-game homestand March 16 against Rockhurst and split the nonconference match up with a 15-8 game one win and an 11-5 loss in game two. The

Bods haven’t lost back-to-back games all year, another streak they hope to continue with this week’s games against Mo. Western.

The schedule gets progressively harder as the season goes on, beginning with the Griffons, who sit eighth in the MIAA standings.