Box Score HOBBS, N.M. –
Brad Bass said going into the season that the 2017 Wayland Baptist baseball team knows its way around the batter's box.
"If you like offense, this team will be fun to watch," were Bass' exact words.
It didn't take long for the 20
th-ranked Pioneers to prove their coach spot-on. After scoring 36 runs in a home-opening sweep of University of the Southwest on Friday, Wayland went to Hobbs on Sunday and again produced runs in bunches, this time 38 of them.
The Pioneers rolled to a near-record 27-9 victory in Sunday afternoon's first game before game two was suspended in the top of the fourth inning due to darkness with Wayland in command, 11-0. Bass said the teams will look to complete the game (WBU had the bases loaded with no outs) later in the season, but for now – because the required five innings weren't logged – the game is incomplete.
"That first game took a long time to finish, and we just ran out of light," Bass said.
Although disappointed the Pioneers weren't able to finish the fourth game and make it a season-opening weekend sweep of the Mustangs, Bass was overjoyed with his team's performance, including Friday's 24-2 and 12-6 victories.
"Going into the weekend I told a couple of people (based on intrasquad scrimmages) that we have four potential first-team all-Americans…either that or our pitching isn't very good, and I think our pitching is really good," Bass said.
The 27 wins in Sunday's opener came within one run of matching the program record of runs. The mark was set in a 28-8 win over College of Santa Fe on April 9, 2009.
After USW's Felipe Lopez knocked a grand slam, the Pioneers trailed 5-1 after the first inning. Wayland came right back in the top of the second to tie it, and from there Wayland just kept rolling.
WBU led 9-8 going into the fifth when the Pioneers pushed across four runs courtesy of a grand slam by freshman
Manuel Rios of Lubbock, the only homer of the game for Wayland. They got five more in the sixth to take an 18-8 edge, then exploded for nine runs in the seventh to put it away.
"(Southwest) came out enthusiastic and playing hard. It looked like things were going to be a little different (than Friday), but our guys just hit…a lot," Bass said. "We scored runs in buckets."
On the mound for Wayland, freshman
Broedy Burris of Denver City had all of the answers against the Mustangs. After junior starter
Jonathan Frost went three innings and freshmen
Tristen Hefner and
Ryne Williams pitched the fourth, Burris came on in the fifth and was sensational. Over the final three innings, Burris allowed just one hit and one unearned run with three walks and a strikeout.
"He pitched really well," Bass said. "He shut down a team that had been manufacturing runs all day."
So did game two starter
Bryson Calaway. Another freshman making his collegiate debut, Calaway didn't allow a hit through the first three innings. He struck out four, and USW's only base runner boarded via a walk.
"He was really good," Bass said. "He had a really good outing going. It's unfortunate we had to shut it down."
Offensively,
Alex Mumm and
Caleb Davidson delivered home runs for the Pioneers, and Rios was robbed of another round-tripper after his game 1 slam.
Wayland returns to action with a pair of home doubleheaders against Sterling College (Kan.) at 2 p.m. Friday and noon Saturday.
Bass knows things will get tougher and that his young pitching staff will need to gain experience in a hurry, but he likes what he's seen so far, especially his team's depth.
"We're counting on a lot of freshmen and they have a lot of maturing to do," he said, adding, "We do a lot of intrasquadding, and those games are really, really competitive and get our guys ready to play. When we went to the bench (this weekend), those guys were hitting home runs, triples, doubles…
"Not only is the present really good, but the future is very bright as well."
