Baseball at Saint Mary's for three-game series

PROVO, Utah — BYU baseball resumes West Coast Conference play March 31- April 2 versus Saint Mary’s at Louis Guisto Field in Moraga, California. Thursday’s game is set for 3 p.m. PDT, with Friday and Saturday contests scheduled for 1 p.m. PDT. 

All three games will be streamed live on the WCC Network and broadcast on the BYU Radio Network —107.9 FM, BYU Cougars app and BYUCougars.com.

SERIES HISTORY. Thursday marks the 36th meeting between BYU and Saint Mary’s. The Cougars are 25-10 all-time and have won the last six contests against the Gaels—the longest winning streak in series history. The first game between the two schools was played on March 14, 1969 and ended in a 12-4 Cougar victory. 

GAELS REVIEW. Saint Mary’s enters the series coming off a 10-5 road win over Cal of the Pac-12 on Tuesday night. The win increased the Gaels’ season record to 15-10. In conference play, SMC is 0-6 and has back-to-back series losses to LMU and San Diego. The Gaels are 2-8 in their last 10 games.

COUGAR REWIND. BYU defeated Washington State of the Pac-12 on Tuesday at home, 9-3, and is now 11-0 on the year when scoring at least six runs. The Cougars played four games last week, posting back-to-back wins over Utah Valley (12-5) and No. 19 ranked Gonzaga (11-2), before dropping the final two games of the weekend series to the Bulldogs 6-3 and 9-4. BYU is 5-5 over its last 10 games.

POWER BALL. With the win over WSU on Tuesday, BYU is 7-2 versus Power Five programs in 2022. BYU also has wins over then No. 6 Oklahoma State (8-6), Ohio State (9-6), Utah (10-3), and a program-first series sweep of Arizona State in Phoenix (4-2, 6-5, 19-3). 

ON THE HILL. Taking the mound for game one is right-handed sophomore Jack Sterner, who has a 2-1 record in six starts. He leads BYU in innings pitched (31.2) and has an ERA of 2.56. In his last outing, Sterner went six innings, surrendered just one earned run for an 11-2 win over Gonzaga. The sophomore right hander struck out four and left the game with a 4-1 lead over Zags ace Gabriel Hughes, who also went six innings. Sterner is currently second in the WCC in league games with an ERA of 0.75.

The rest of the starting rotation includes righties Ryan Brady, a sophomore from Park City, Utah, and Janzen Keisel, a freshman from Gunnison, Utah. Both will be making their seventh appearance in 2022. Keisel has thrown 23.2 innings, has a 4.94 ERA and leads the Cougars in strikeouts with 29. Brady is 1-2 in three starts with an ERA of 5.09 over 23 innings.

AT THE PLATE. Offensively the Cougars are led by Brock Watkins, Ryan Sepede, Mitch McIntyre and Jacob Wilk. Watkins leads the team in total bases (38) and batting average (.320), while McIntyre is tied with Watkins for the team lead in hits (24) and leads the Cougars in walks (16) and OBP (.442). Sepede is the Cougars RBI leader (23) and is second in battling average (.307) and total bases (36). 

Wilk has been hot in WCC games and is ranked in the top 10 in the conference in several categories including slugging percentage (.714), OBP (.444) and OPS (1.158). Other Cougars in the top 10 in conference rankings include Sepede in batting average (.354), slugging (.591) and OPS (1.031) and McIntyre in OBP (.500), slugging (.571), OPS (1.071) and triples (2).