March 15, 2010

GREENVILLE, N.C. - No. 10 East Carolina (8-6) finally picked up a win in the state of California last week notching a 3-2 victory over Pepperdine in a pitching duel that saw both teams (four pitchers) combine for 25 strikeouts. Seth Maness recorded his second consecutive win on the season after dropping his first two outings by fanning a career-best 11 hitters. Senior DH Kyle Roller provided the offense smacking his third home run of the season and the 42nd of his career to right-center in the first inning.

Mar. 15 East Carolina Baseball Notebook

National Ranking: (as of March 8, 2010)
No. 10 - Rivals.com
No. 13 - Baseball America
No. 17 - NCBWA
No. 17 - Ping!Baseball
No. 20 - Collegiate Baseball
No. 21 - ESPN/USA Today

Current Streak:W-1

Last Week: 1-3
Mar. 10 Loss at Cal State Northridge (5-3)
Mar. 11 Loss at Pepperdine (5-3)
Mar. 12 Loss at Pepperdine (10-3)
Mar. 13 Win at Pepperdine (3-2)

Upcoming Week:
Home vs. Gardner-Webb (Mar. 16)
Road vs. High Point (Mar. 17) - makeup from Mar. 3
Home vs. Monmouth (Mar. 19-21)

Pirate Hitter-of-the-Week
Dustin Harrington, SS, Junior
Harrington extended his current hit streak to 22 games last week during the Pirates four-game road trip to California ... He batted a team-best .438 (7-for-16) with three runs scored ... Collected a pair of multi-hit games (2 vs. Cal State Northridge - 3/10, 3 vs. Pepperdine - 3/11) ... Scored a run in all three games at Pepperdine and stole his second base of the season in the first game against the Waves ... He also led the Pirates with a .438 on-base percentage while ranking third in slugging (.438) ... During his 22-game hit streak, which is the fourth-longest in school history, Harrington is batting .391 (36-for-92) with three home runs, 11 RBI, 16 runs and five doubles ... He has collected 10 multi-hit games during the streak that started on May 23, 2008 ... On the season he is batting a team-best .421 (24-for-57) with a home run and five RBI ... He is also the team leader in hits (24), runs (12), total bases (32) and on-base percentage (.450).

Pirate Pitcher-of-the-Week
Seth Maness, Junior, RHP
Maness picked up his second-straight win of the season to even his record to 2-2 with his victory against Pepperdine on Saturday ... He struck out a career-best 11 hitters where he allowed two runs on six hits ... Retired six of the first seven batters with three strikeouts ... He recorded eight of the final 12 outs by strikeouts from the fourth to seventh innings, including the side in the fifth ... Pushed his season total of punch outs to 24 while walking just two ... On the season he has allowed 11 runs (all earned) on 24 hits in 24.1 innings with a 4.07 ERA.

PIRATE NOTES:
Kyle Roller hit his third home run of the season and 42 of his career in the series finale against Pepperdine ... On the week he batted .333 (5-for-15) with a double, four RBI and two runs scored ... He had two hits and two RBI in each of the last two games against Pepperdine to push his career totals to 55 multi-hit and 47 multi-RBI games ... With his four RBI and one home run on the week, Roller moved into sole possession of sixth place on the school's RBI charts and fourth on the HR list.

Corey Thompson continued his hot hitting by batting .357 (5-for-14) with two doubles and an RBI on the Pirates four-game west coast trip ... Thompson collected a pair of multi-hit games (3 vs. Pepperdine - 3/11; 2 vs. Pepperdine - 3/13) ... He currently ranks fourth on the team in hitting (.327/16-for-49) with a home run and 10 RBI, which is tied for the team lead ... With his two multi-hit games, he pushed his career total to five.

On its west coast trip, the Pirates used six relievers out of the bull pen with five of them (Mike Anderson, Joseph Hughes, Seth Simmons, Sthil Sowers and Mike Wright) working 11.2 shutout innings allowing nine hits, with two walks, nine strikeouts and a save ... Freshman Joseph Hughes made his collegiate debut against Pepperdine on Friday, Mar. 12 working 3.2 shutout innings in relief where he allowed two hits and fanned three ... Patrick Somers also appeared in relief working 1.2 innings allowing five runs (three earned) on three hits with a walk and two strikeouts.

Sthil Sowers has not allowed an earned run in 6.2 innings (three appearances) this season and boasts a 0.00 ERA ... He tossed three scoreless innings of relief against Cal State Northridge giving up two hits and striking out three.

Reliever Seth Simmons closed out his fourth game of the season picking up the save in the Pirates lone win on the west coast ... He worked two scoreless innings of relief giving up a pair of hits and fanning three ... He now has 15 career saves which ties him for third place on the school's all-time saves list with Shane Mathews (2004-07).

Head Coach Billy Godwin recorded his 169th win as the Pirates skipper of the weekend and picked up career win No. 431 ... He currently ranks fourth on the all-time wins list at ECU and needs 17 wins to move into third place passing ECU Hall of Famer Earl Smith (185).

During the week, the Pirates pitching staff allowed 22 runs (16 earned) with 27 strikeouts, nine walks and posted a 4.36 ERA ... Offensively they batted .232 (26-for-125) with one home run and eight RBI ... Two of ECU's 12 runs and 11 of 29 hits came with two outs ... On the season ECU has scored 21 of its 70 runs with two outs (30.0 percent).