By Staff
SWING FOR THE FENCE- MCC's Nathan Sanders hits a home run in an earlier game. Photo by Paula Merritt/ The Meridian Star
By Jeff Byrd/staff writer
April 12, 2002
It's back to Miss-Lou Conference action on Saturday for the Meridian Community College baseball team.
Meridian, 15-20, travels to New Orleans to take on Delgado Community College in a three-game series. Delgado took two out of three games from the Eagles when the two clubs met in Meridian on March 23-24.
With Bossier Parish taking a game from Delgado last week, the Eagles find themselves in the cellar of three-team league at 2-4. Delgado clinched a berth in the Region 23 Tournament to be hosted by MCC winning one of its two games with Bossier. The Dolphins have seven wins in league play.
MCC head coach Mike Federico says he is putting the focus on just getting a win at a time, rather than trying to think about needing a sweep.
After falling eight games under .500, MCC has won its last three games beating Alabama Southern 10-2 , Jones 15-4, and East Central 10-3. Federico used a staff approach to all three games in order to get the team lined up for the Delgado series.
Doolittle will probably draw the opening game start. He is 4-2 on the year with a 4.65 earned run average with 48 strike outs in 43 innings pitched.
Jones is 3-3 with a 4.00 ERA. He has 34 fans in 38 innings.
Justin Rayborn will likely start on Sunday. He is 2-4 with a 4.53 ERA.
The Eagles offense is keyed by Adam Smith, Tyler Scarbrough and Lance Dawkins.
Smith and Scarbrough each have belted seven home runs. By going 6-for-his-last-9, going into Wednesday's game with ECCC, Scarbrough took over the batting lead at .357. He also has a team high 33 RBIs.
Smith is right behind at .346 with 32 RBIs. Dawkins started Sunday and drew four walks. He is at .341.
Nate Sanders and Brad McKee are both hitting over .280. First baseman Brian Page has four home runs.
Delgado features a deep bullpen. The Dolphins used six pitchers in pulling out an 11-inning 5-4 win over MCC to clinch the series at Scaggs Field.
The Dolphin offense is led by Mike Forbes, Matt Graziano, Nathan Meiners and Ryan Core.