Baseball now No. 16 in NAIA

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – With one week left in the regular season, the Loyola Wolf Pack baseball team is now the No. 16-ranked team in the NAIA, moving down a couple of spots from the previous poll two weeks ago. Loyola went 5-3 since the last rankings were released, winning a series at UT Southern, midweek games against Louisiana Christian and Spring Hill, and losing a series at Brewton-Parker during that time. 
 

The Wolf Pack is set to host No. 25 William Carey this weekend to close out the regular season, playing all three games at Tulane's Turchin Stadium on Thursday and Friday. Game 1 is set for Thursday at 6 p.m. and a doubleheader starting at 1 p.m. on Friday will close out the season. The Southern States Athletic Conference Baseball Championship will begin on Wednesday, May 1, in Jackson, Tennessee. 
 

Loyola and William Carey are joined in the Top 25 by No. 11 Faulkner, while Point University is in the receiving votes category. 
 

Freshman Jaxon Buratt leads the team at the plate with a .411 batting average and a .549 on-baseball percentage, while Brandon Mooney is next with a .364 average and a .507 on-base percentage and a team-high 63 hits and 68 runs, which is a new school record. Jake Mills (.344), Landon Manson (.339) and Collin Zeringue (.321) join their teammates with batting averages better than .300, and Zeringue has team-highs in RBI (52) and home runs (7). Stephen Still continues to lead the pitching staff with an 8-1 record, recording a 3.68 ERA with 71 strikeouts in 66 innings pitched this season. Prescott Marsh has become the No. 2 weekend starter, posting a 3-0 record with a 2.41 ERA in 33.2 innings. Andrew Riedell (2.35), Carter Holstein (2.76) and Frank Fernandez (3.00) have all pitched more than 15 innings out of the bullpen with a sub-3.00 ERA. 
 

As a team, Loyola leads the SSAC in stolen bases (171), on-base percentage (.457), WHIP (1.48) and walks (319), and second in runs scored (407), triples (10), RBI (332), batting average (.316) and ERA (4.86).