LAKELAND, Fla.—Playing Top 25 teams is nothing out of the ordinary for the Fire baseball team this season. During its first 25 games, Southeastern has played 12 against ranked teams.
The Fire start this week with a game tonight against No. 12 Bellevue, and close the week with No. 2 St. Thomas.
Bellevue enters tonight's game with an 11-2 record, and is ranked first in the latest Perfect Game NAIA Top 25. They have opened their trip to Florida with three wins over Webber International and Cumberland.
Offensively, the Bruins have a .333 team batting average, .410 slugging percentage, and .398 on base percentage. The pitching staff has a 4.09 team ERA with opponents hitting .258 against.
Tuesday's mixed doubleheader features a pair of teams that qualified for last year's NAIA National Championship Opening Round. At 1 p.m., the Fire host St. Francis of Illinois, who Southeastern faced in the national tournament in 2014 at Georgia Gwinnett.
The Fighting Saints are 7-5 to start the year, and open up their southern swing with Warner this afternoon. Senior catcher Zach Barkdull has 11 RBIs in 12 games to start the year, and has four doubles and a pair of home runs.
The day closes with the Fire hosting Spring Arbor University out of Michigan. The Cougars started the season with a win over Ave Maria on Friday, notching a 4-3 win, but dropped both games of Saturday's doubleheader to the Gyrenes 6-0 and 2-0. They will see Keiser today before coming to Lakeland.
Southeastern will host its first Sun Conference weekend series starting Friday against preseason favorite St. Thomas. The Bobcats have compiled a who's who of baseball schedule, having taken on three national tournament qualifiers from last season along with Division II power Palm Beach Atlantic, and countable games against Division I schools Florida International and Miami.
The runner-up in last year's NAIA World Series has scored with relative ease this year, plating 189 runs in 23 games, and have a 4-2 league record. Miami-Dade transfer Jose Gomez is hitting .411 with six doubles, a triple, and two home runs. He's also stolen nine bases.
Live video will be available for each game, and live stats can be found on
Dakstats.
