February 17, 2015
 
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PENSACOLA, Fla. – The University of West Florida baseball team will travel to Mississippi College for the first time in program history to open 2016 Gulf South Conference play on Friday. Games for this weekend have been rescheduled, as the three-game series will start on Friday at 6:00 p.m. followed by a doubleheader on Sunday starting at 1:00 p.m.
 
O'CONNOR NAMED GSC PITCHER OF THE WEEK: Walker O'Connor took home the first weekly conference award for the UWF baseball team in 2016, as the redshirt-junior earned the award after a dominant eight-inning performance against No. 1 Tampa... On Wednesday, O'Connor was also named National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association South Region Pitcher of the Week... UWF took home two South Region Pitcher of the Week awards in 2015, both going to Brandon Nagem... O'Connor hurled eight shutout innings against the defending national champions, while striking out a career-high eight and walking none... O'Connor held Tampa to a .173 batting average for the game and only allowed five hits... O'Connor, who opened the season with 3.2 innings and three earned runs against Florida Southern, lowered his 2016 ERA from 7.36 to 2.31... O'Connor only allowed two runners to get to second base and no Spartan reached third base on Sunday... The GSC Pitcher of the Week honor marks as the first time the Massachusetts native has received the award... Tampa had its 18-game win streak snapped while they were shutout for the first time since the 2013 season.
 
PRICE BREAKS OUT OF EARLY SEASON SLUMP: Outfielder John Price, the 2015 Alabama Community College Player of the Year, struggled a bit to start the 2016 season but had a breakout game at the plate in UWF's 1-0 win over Tampa... Price scored the game's lone run on a Jean Figueroa single while posting a 3-for-4 day in the batter's box... Price's performance marks as the first three-hit showing by a UWF player in 2016, while his triple in the bottom of the sixth was the first three-bagger for the Argonauts this season... Price is one of three Argos to reach base in all seven games in 2016, joining Alex Greene and Justin Ambrosino in that category.
 
CLOSE CALLS: Despite a 3-4 record after the season's first couple weeks, in UWF's four losses, UWF has lost by an average of only 1.5 runs per game... The Argonauts certainly faced a tough early season schedule, as Tampa remains No. 1 in the nation and Florida Southern moved to No. 13 in DII according to Collegiate Baseball Newspaper... Two of UWF's losses have come in extra innings while one against Florida Southern was due to weather forcing the contest to be shortened... Through the team's first seven games, West Florida has managed to out-hit their opponents with a .278 team batting average in comparison to a .254 batting average against... As usual, the UWF arms have had an impressive showing with a 2.80 ERA in 2016 while UWF opponents currently own a 4.05 ERA.
 
"BASE STEALERS": UWF backstop Kyle Hamner proved to be one of the best defensive catchers in the GSC in 2015, not committing an error and throwing out 41.7% of would-be base stealers, good for second best in the conference... Through Hamner's first three games behind the plate, the opposition did not test Hamner's arm, however in the series against Tampa the Spartans quickly regretted their decision as Hamner would throw out two of three base runners at second base.
 
LEADING THE OFFENSE: After missing the vast majority of 2015 with an injury, Jean Figueroa has been a focal point for the Argonaut offense in 2016... Figueroa currently leads the team in hits, with 9, while leading the team with a .346 batting average... Figueroa has recorded a hit six of seven games so far in 2015.
 
GSC OUTLOOK: The Gulf South Conference had four teams in the Collegiate Baseball Newspaper Preaseason Top 40 while currently having seven teams in the NCBWA South Region Poll... The defending conference champions, West Alabama, currently rank No. 8 in the country and No. 2 in the region... West Florida, despite the 3-4 record, remains to be the only GSC team in the Perfect Game NCAA Division II top 10... West Florida last season finished fourth in the GSC while posting a 21-11 record in conference play... UWF was selected to finish second in the league by GSC coaches in the conference's annual preseason poll.
 
LONG RELIEF: Head coach Mike Jeffcoat has had the luxury of having former award-winning starting pitchers able to come out of the bullpen in long relief situations... Jarrod Petree, a 2015 All-GSC Second Team selection, has made a seamless transition to the bullpen, possessing a 1.42 ERA with a team-high 6.1 relief innings in 2015... Petree threw three innings of shutout baseball against No. 1 Tampa last Friday while only surrendering two hits with three strikeouts and no walks... Earlier last week, Petree got his first win of the season after three solid innings against Mobile, where he struck out four and surrendered his first and only earned run of the season... Anthony Mazzurco has appeared in two long relief situations so far this season, having six innings pitched on the young season... Mazzurco, a former ace at Lake Sumter State, possesses a 3.00 ERA with seven strikeouts and one walk.
 
OTHER BULLPEN CONTRIBUTIONS: UWF has utilized eight different pitchers in relief situations, as the Argonauts bullpen owns a 2.52 ERA... Steve McClellan and Josh McLaney both have 0.00 ERA's after a combined 7.1 innings while each having one save on the season... McLaney leads the team with four appearances.
 
RECAPPING SERIES WITH NO. 1 TAMPA: West Florida hosted Tampa in the regular season for the first time since 1998, with the Argos being able to snag the third contest after falling in a pair of heart-breakers in games one and two.
 
GAME ONE: Heading into the bottom of the seventh, UWF faced a 3-0 deficit against the Spartans... Colby Brown recorded a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the seventh, scoring Ladeavon Matthews... In the bottom of the eighth, Alex Greene recorded an RBI single to score Kyle Hamner to cut Tampa's lead to one... UWF was able to scratch across the game-tying run in the bottom of the ninth, as Brown posted another RBI, this time on a fielder's choice and an error by the Tampa defense... Tampa would take the lead and close out game one in the top of the 10th with an RBI double, giving the Argonauts their second extra-innings loss of the season... Brandon Nagem started on the mound for UWF, tossing six innings allowing three runs on six hits while striking out seven... Justin Ambrosino and Hamner each posted multi-hit performances at the plate.
 
GAME TWO: UWF tried to pull off another comeback in game two, as UWF was able to put across two runs in the bottom of the ninth and have the game-winning run in scoring position before Tampa halted UWF's comeback attempt and took  a 5-4 decision... JT Granat was credited with the loss despite allowing just one earned run on six hits... Nic Strasser, Alex Greene, Jean Figueroa and Kyle Hamner each had an RBI, while Figueroa and Greene had two hits each.
 
GAME THREE: Walker O'Connor stole the show on Sunday, limiting the Tampa offense to no runs and just five hits... UWF would go on to snap No. 1 Tampa's 18-game win streak, which carried over 10 wins from its run to the NCAA Division II National Championship... It also marked as the first time since 2013 that Tampa has been shutout, while it was the first time since 2012 UWF has beat a No. 1-ranked opponent... Jean Figueroa recorded the game's lone RBI      while John Price broke out with a 3-for-4 day including a triple.
 
SERIES HISTORY VS. MC: UWF and Mississippi College squared off for the first time in program history in 2015, with West Florida taking all three contests by a score of 5-2, 3-2 and 6-5... It will be the first time in program history UWF travels to Clinton, Mississippi... Jimmy Redovian had a big game in game one of the series with a 2-for-4 with a home run and two RBI... Brandon Nagem went eight strong innings allowing only two runs and fanning eight... Alex Greene and Chase Kiefer had two-hit performances against Mississippi College in the final game of last year's series.
 
SCOUTING MC: Most recently, the Choctaws fell via a walk off home run against No. 27 Southern Arkansas... MC has a 5-2 record on the young season, sweeping Tougaloo (NAIA) in the year's first series and taking two-of-three against North Greenville... MC's first three opponents combined for a 76-83 record last year... Logan Ferrell paces the Choctaw lineup with a .480 (12-25) batting average with three doubles and four RBI... Caleb Upton leads the team with 7 RBI on the season.
 
Projected Starting Pitchers:
Friday: UWF – Brandon Nagem  vs. MC – Samuel Harrison
Saturday G1: UWF – JT Granat vs.  MC – Blake Crim
Saturday G2: UWF – Walker O'Connor vs. MC – Jake Fraze
 
To stay updated on the UWF baseball team, follow the team on Twitter @UWF_Baseball. For information on all UWF Athletics, visit GoArgos.com.