Memphis at #21 Tulane notes
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April 5, 2007

MEMPHIS, Tenn. - For the third time in as many Conference USA weekends, the University of Memphis baseball club will face one of the nation's 30 best teams according to current polls. This time it will be the 21st-ranked Tulane Green Wave that Memphis will face, as the Tiger make the trip to New Orleans for Friday, Saturday and Sunday matchups. First pitch for Friday night's series opener is slated for 6:30 p.m. Sunday's series finale will be the first of a series of eight televised games around C-USA.

Memphis enters the weekend riding the momentum of its first sweep of Southern Miss since 1999. The Tigers are 17-11 and have won eight straight home games. Seniors co-captains Bill Moss and Ben Grisham swept the C-USA weekly awards after a posting solid series performances. Moss, who leads the league in slugging and is third with a .379 batting average, was 6-for-9 in the series, with six RBI, three runs, a pair of doubles and a homer. Grisham had a career night in the series opener on Friday. He tossed eight innings of shutout ball and struck out a career-high six batters.

The Tiger offense has come alive as of late behind the bats of Adam Amar, Michael Murray and Chris Kirkland. Amar is hitting .500 in league play, while Murray is enjoying a 14-game hit streak. Kirkland has hit safely in nine consecutive contests and is second on the team with a .370 average. Joey Lieberman joins Moss and Kirkland as the only other Tiger with an average over .300. Junior K.K. Chalmers leads C-USA with 15 stolen bases.

The Memphis pitching staff is reliever Matt Yokley. Yokley is 3-2 with a 2.14 ERA and three saves in 11 outings. He leads all Tiger pitchers with 31 strikeouts in 21innings--a clip of 13.29 strikeouts per nine innings. Senior Dusty Davis is 3-1 with a 4.23 ERA. The southpaw has logged 27.2 innings of work and has struck out 16. Opposing hitters bat just .204 against him.

At 22-8, Tulane sports the league's highest winning percentage along with 17-4 mark at home this year. The Green Wave, who is off to their best C-USA start since 2004, reeled of five straight league wins before falling to ECU in the series finale last weekend. Tulane was tabbed to finish second in the league's preseason poll.

The Green Wave boasts some of the conference's brightest talents in 2006 Freshman of the Year Warren McFadden, and All C-USA selections Sean Morgan, Daniel Latham and Brad Emaus. McFadden, Morgan and Emaus were all outlined by Baseball America as three of the nation's top 100 college prospects for the June Major League Baseball Draft. Emaus and McFadden were both noted as a preseason All-American selection by Baseball America Tulane returns 23 letterwinners and eight starters from the 2006 squad

Tulane, who has won seven of its last eight contests and 11 of its last 13, leads the league in on-base percentage and ranks in the top three with 318 hits. Cat Everett leads the way with a .368 average. Emaus, Tim Guidry, Anthony Scelfo, Jared Dyer and Aja Barto all hit over .300. TU hits .303 as a team. Everett has a team-best 43 hits and nine stolen bases, while McFadden has seven doubles. Emaus has driven in 27 to go with four homers.

On the hill, Tulane has posted six shutouts to go with a league-best 3.04 ERA and 270 strikeouts. Morgan leads the staff and league with 79 strikeouts already this year in 53.2 innings of work. He has a 1.84 ERA and has held opposing hitters to just .178 at the plate and averages and astounding 13.25 strikeouts per nine innings pitched. He has only issued 22 walks. University of Virginia transfer Shooter Hunt has put up strong numbers and leads the staff with a 1.53 ERA in eight starts. He is 6-2 with 51 strikeouts.

Tulane leads the all-time series 35-27. Despite three homers from Amar and a series-opening win for the Tigers, the Green Wave took last year's series in Memphis, 2-1. The Tigers have defeated the Green Wave just eight times in the last 35 meetings between the two schools. Memphis has won a series from Tulane since taking two-out-of-three in the 1996 series.

Memphis is 4-6 against ranked foes this year.