Baseball

Cougars Travel to Quincy;
Close Regular Season Against Bellarmine
         The SIUE baseball team will travel to Quincy for a Wednesday doubleheader before hosting Bellarmine in the final regular-season Great Lakes Valley Conference series.
         Wednesday’s doubleheader is crucial for SIUE and Quincy. SIUE is just a half-game back of Quincy for fourth place in the conference standings. The top six teams in the conference standings advance to the GLVC Championships in two weeks.
         SIUE, now 20-23 and 13-12 in the Great Lakes Valley Conference, took two games of a three-game GLVC series from Indianapolis this past weekend. Coach Gary Collins hopes his club can find a way to keep the momentum going into the final five games of the season.
         “We haven’t kept momentum at all this season,” Collins said. “We do not seem to know what momentum is.”
         SIUE previously defeated Quincy at Roy Lee Field 10-5 earlier this season.
         The Cougars will face Bellarmine on Friday for a 7 p.m. start at GMC Stadium in Sauget. The series then returns to Roy Lee Field for a Saturday doubleheader beginning at noon.
         Bellarmine is currently next to last in the GLVC with a 12-32 and 9-18 in the GLVC.
         “Everything is riding on these last five games,” Collins said. “We are in much better shape now than we were a week ago.”
         Craig Ohlau (Chester) leads the team in hitting with a .345 batting average. Jason Kessler (Mattoon) and Joe Wargo (Streator) follow with .322 and .321 averages, respectively.
         David Briesacher (Waterloo) leads the pitching staff with four victories. Brad Hinton (Clinton) and Brian Keating (St. Louis) follow with three wins each.