April 3, 2008

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - The UAB baseball team will host Presbyterian this weekend at Young Memorial Field during its off weekend in Conference USA play. The series gets underway Friday night at 7:00 p.m. and continues Saturday at 2:00 p.m. with the finale slated for 1:00 p.m. on Sunday. The Blazers enter the series on a high note after beating Alabama Wednesday night.

All three games can be followed live on Gametracker at UABsports.com and can be watched on a live web stream on Blazer All-Access at UABsports.com.

This weekend will be a reunion of sorts for UAB pitching coach Doug Kovash. The assistant head coach of the Blazers spent 11 seasons as the head coach at Presbyterian from 1994-2004 during which he compiled 320 victories.

The Blazers demonstrated continued improvements during its two midweek games with Alabama and hope to continue that trend this weekend against the Blue Hose. UAB enters the weekend 10-16 after its midweek split with the Crimson Tide.

There will be a new-look weekend pitching rotation for the Blazers this weekend after the Blazers exhausted Mitch Kloskowski in Wednesday night's win over Alabama.

Senior Brandon Wallace will take the mound on Friday in hopes of getting his team off to a good start to the weekend. Wallace is 1-1 on the year and holds a 3.90 ERA. In 93.0 career innings pitched as a Blazer, Wallace has never given up a triple or a home run.

Junior Kyle Roberson, who has been very dependable out of the bullpen in nine relief appearances this season, will make his first start of the year on Saturday. Roberson ranks second on the team with 21 strikeouts and owns an ERA of 3.26 and a record 3-2.

On Sunday, junior James Oliver will take the hill for his second start of the season. Oliver will look to improve on his 7.27 ERA having shown great upside in numerous appearances this season.

Taking the mound for Presbyterian this weekend will be right-handers Mitchell Odom, Jesse Harmon and Ben Dollar, respectively, all of whom hold ERAs of higher than six runs per game.

UAB first baseman Ryan Keedy saw his career-long 19-game hit streak come to an end on Wednesday and will look to start another on Friday as he continues to emerge as one of the elite hitters in Conference USA. Keedy leads the league with his .447 batting average and 17 doubles.

Left fielder Phil Bell ranks second on the club with a .312 batting average and is on a career-long 17-game hit streak entering the weekend.

Presbyterian comes into this weekend's series with a record of 7-17 having lost four straight and seven of its last eight after losing both games of a doubleheader with Furman on Wednesday.

The Blue Hose is led by first baseman Nate Horton who is batting .329 with 13 RBI this season. Third baseman Jared Combs leads the club in homers (3) and runs driven in (17), but is hitting just .213 for the year.

Presbyterian owns a staff ERA of 6.65 and opponents are hitting .318 against it.

This weekend will be the first-ever meeting between the Blue Hose and the Blazers.