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Ceremony Set For May 8

ARLINGTON, Texas – The UT Arlington baseball program will retire former Maverick and current Kansas City Royals manager Trey Hillman’s #1 jersey number prior to the first pitch of UT Arlington’s Saturday, May 8, game against Stephen F. Austin at 2 p.m. at Clay Gould Ballpark.

Hillman’s (1982-85) #1 jersey will join former head coach Butch McBroom (#30) and the late former player, assistant coach and head coach Clay Gould (#8) as the only jersey numbers retired in UT Arlington baseball history.

Hillman, the only three-time All-Southland Conference selection in UTA history, will be in attendance for the ceremony as the Kansas City Royals are schedule to take on the Texas Rangers at the Ballpark in Arlington May 6-9.

“It is a great honor, especially to join the only other two people who have had their numbers retired,” Hillman said. “I have great memories playing at UTA and Arlington will always be my hometown. I’m looking forward to coming back and being able to share that day with everyone at UT Arlington.”

Trey Hillman

Just 16 months ago, Hillman returned to his alma mater when he was named a Distinguished Alumni at the 43rd Annual UT Arlington Distinguished Alumni Gala. After a four-year career with the Mavericks, Hillman signed a free agent contract with the Cleveland Indians. Hillman later returned to UT Arlington where he earned a bachelor’s degree in exercise science and sport studies in 1991.

One of the top players in UT Arlington history, Hillman became the first Maverick baseball player inducted into the UT Arlington Athletic Hall of Honor in 1992. Hillman’s .442 batting average in 1985 – which led the Southland Conference – remains the top single-season batting average in UTA history and is the second best average in Southland Conference history.

After completing his professional playing career in the Cleveland Indians’ minor league system in 1987, Hillman spent one season scouting with the Indians before becoming the youngest minor league manager at that time with the New York Yankees Class-A club in the Carolina League. He then spent 12 years managing in the Yankees minor league system from 1990-2001.

After one season as the director of player development with the Texas Rangers, Hillman accepted a managerial position with the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters in Japan. During five seasons in Japan, the Nippon-Ham Fighters made three playoff appearances (2004, 2006, 2007), which includes winning the 2006 Japan Series championship and the 2006 Asian Championship. It was the first title for the Nippon-Ham Fighters franchise since 1962.

Hillman became the 15th manager in the history of the Royals on Oct. 19, 2007, and has followed by leading the Royals to 140 wins in two seasons, which is the most wins during the first two seasons by a Royals manager since Bob Boone won 145 games in 1995-96.

Two other familiar faces to the UTA program will be on hand with Hillman as his third base coach, Dave Owen (1977-79), and bullpen coach, Steve Foster (1987-88), will also return to UT Arlington for the ceremony.

Owen became the first former Maverick to make it to the big leagues with the Chicago Cubs in 1983 and Foster pitched three seasons with the Cincinnati Reds from 1991-1993. Owen will start his third season on the Royals coaching staff this year while Foster is joining the Royals after spending the past three seasons as the bullpen coach for the Florida Marlins.

(Release)

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VILLANOVA, Pa.–The spring schedule for the 2010 season has been finalized and was released today, as Villanova will begin its 56-game regular season schedule on Friday, February 19. The team’s schedule includes 29 games against non-conference opponents in addition to the 27-game BIG EAST slate.

Villanova Head Coach Joe Godri

During the annual Spring Break trip to Florida – which begins with the Big Ten/BIG EAST competition – the Wildcats will take part in two different tournaments. The second is the RussMatt Central Florida Invitational, which is being held at Chain of Lakes Park in Winter Haven, the former spring training home of the Cleveland Indians.

Complete 2010 Villanova Schedule

Villanova will be playing in Winter Haven for the first time under ninth-year head coach Joe Godri, and will take on Duquesne, Kansas State, Western Michigan, Northeastern and St. Bonaventure at the tournament. The contest against Kansas State will be the Wildcats first against a team from the Big 12 Conference since Villanova played a three-game series at Texas back in 2006.

A pair of home tournaments are also featured on the Wildcats schedule, as the team will host the Villanova Classic as well as the Big Five Baseball Bash. The second of the two tournaments is being hosted in conjunction with La Salle, Saint Joseph’s and Temple.

“I am very pleased with the makeup of our non-conference schedule,” Godri said. “We are looking forward to playing in the Big Ten/BIG EAST challenge for the first time. I believe these are two evenly matched conferences in college baseball and it is exciting to have the opportunity to play the reigning Big Ten champion.”

The Wildcats open BIG EAST Conference play at home with a three-game series against Cincinnati from March 26-28. The Bearcats will be making just their second visit to the Villanova Ballpark at Plymouth and the first since 2006, when Villanova won two of three games. The other league opponents on the home schedule for the Wildcats are Pittsburgh (April 16-18), Georgetown (April 30-May 2) and Notre Dame (May 14-16). The series against the Fighting Irish will take place during the team’s annual Alumni Weekend.

On the road in BIG EAST play, Villanova will take on Louisville (April 1-3), Connecticut (April 9-11), USF (April 23-25), Rutgers (May 7-9) and West Virginia (May 20-22). The Wildcats end the regular season with the three-game set against the Mountaineers, which will be the first trip to West Virginia for Villanova since 2006. That series will also mark the first time since 2004 that the Wildcats end the regular season on the road.

(Release)

BGSU Head Coach Danny Schmitz

season and defending their home field with an 81 percent success rate. The Cardinal pitching staff led the Big East in team ERA (4.32) as well as in homeruns (85) and total bases (1,124). Last year UL swept BG in a three game set by a combined score of 33-12.

Complete 2010 Bowling Green Schedule

The road trip through Ohio’s southern neighbor continues with three games against the University of Kentucky. Though UK baseball finished fifth in the SEC East Division, College Baseball Newspaper has tabbed the Wildcats as having the sixth-best recruiting class in the nation, an honor the program has received two years in a row.

To open the month of March the Falcons will head further south to the former home of the Cleveland Indians spring training program, Winter Haven, Florida. The Falcons will spend nine days (March 5-14) in Winter Haven and play as many games during that span. Only two of the eight opposing teams return for this year’s Russ Matt Central Florida Invitational with Indiana and Sacred Heart, but six very skilled teams will visit to provide the Falcons some tough competition.

The Falcons will take the field against Northeastern, who finished the 2009 season with a 28-25 overall mark, to open their slate during the invitational. The next three days will feature match ups against Rhode Island, Butler and Sacred Heart. Those three teams sport a combined record of 77-89-1 from a season ago with Rhode Island garnering the most success following a 37-20-1 campaign a season ago. After enjoying an off-day at the mid-way point of the week long trip, the Falcons will head back into battle against the Ivy League’s Yale University for a double-header against the Bulldogs. North Dakota State and Indiana will round out the schedule for the duration of the tournament before the Brown and Orange return to Bowling Green.

Last year, the Falcons finished 5-3 during their stay in Winter Haven with signature wins over Bradley in extra innings and against 2010 recurring opponent Eastern Kentucky University. Of the two teams that the Falcons will play in back-to-back years in the tournament, Indiana and Sacred Heart, the Falcons were 1-1 in games against those opponents having lost to the Hoosiers 15-7 and defeating the Pioneers in a pitcher’s duel, 1-0.
Bowling Green will bring baseball back to northwest Ohio when they open their home schedule with a local rival in the Findlay Oilers. The Falcons will engage in a battle for I-75 South on March 16 at Warren E. Stellar Field for the home opener. Bowling Green has won their last ten home openers at Warren Steller Field and has not lost since a 7-6 defeat to the Wright State Raiders in the 1999 season opener.

Schmitz and Company continue to yield southern hospitality as the team travels east straight from EKU to play another Big East team in the West Virginia Mountaineers. The Mountaineers finished third in the Big East last season and only lost five games at home. The Falcons had not played a Big East team since 2008 when the Falcons fell to Villanova 10-8 in Bradenton, FL. This year, the teams will meet at a neutral site at VA Memorial Stadium in Chillicothe, Ohio.

Of the early non-conference schedule, head coach Danny Schmitz said, “This is probably the toughest schedule we’ve put together. It is a schedule that we wanted to challenge our team with. We’re doing that for a reason. We have to get ourselves ready for conference play because the Mid-American Conference is an outstanding baseball conference.”

Schmitz continued, “We have high expectations [of the players]. You still have to earn it each day you cross the white lines. This schedule is going to be very, very competitive. We hope our kids are going to be up to the task.”

With their return back to Falcon country, BGSU will open its conference slate with MAC West foe Central Michigan on March 24. It will be the only time the Chippewas and the Falcons will play in 2010 but will ready Bowling Green for a home weekend set with Northern Illinois beginning two days later.

Bowling Green will step out of conference again to play Atlantic-10 power house Dayton for a single showdown to close out the month of March. The Dragons and Falcons have had three of their last five matchups cancelled due to weather since 2007. In those two matchups, the Dragons have come out on top both times. In their lone matchup in 2007, the Falcons took the Dragons to 12 innings before losing 8-7 in an extra-inning thriller.

The next four contests between April 2 and April 6 will take the Falcons into Michigan for a three-game series against Eastern Michigan. BG will then hop on the bus to East Lansing, MI. for its first contest with a Big Ten opponent in the Michigan State Spartans. Since 2001, Bowling Green has a 15-19 record when playing in the state of Michigan with nearly as many weather cancellations as wins.

The Falcons will then embark on their final game with a Michigan school against Michigan on April 14. Last year the Falcons beat the Wolverines 8-3 after not having played them since the 2002 season when the Falcons lost 4-3.

Right across the border heading back into Ohio, MAC rival Toledo will be waiting for the visiting Falcons for a weekend series to be held in the Glass City. Bowling Green possess 102 wins against Toledo over their 88 year rivalry. That stands as the most wins BGSU has over any school they have played in program history.

After back-to-back home games against Dayton and Western Michigan on April 20-21, the Falcons hit the road again, this time going to Athens for three games against Ohio and then heading to northeast Ohio for the season finale versus Cleveland State.

Six consecutive Mid-American conference home games follow on the Falcon schedule when Bowling Green plays host to the Miami Redhawks and Akron Zips to close out April heading into the first week of May (April 30-May 9).

For the first time since April 26, 2006 the Falcons will head back to South Bend, Ind. for a single out-of-conference game with the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame. The last time Bowling Green took the trip to South Bend the Falcons outscored the Irish 11-8 on their home field. That win had broken a ten game winless streak against Notre Dame since 1990.

Bowling Green then heads to Kent, Ohio to take on the once nationally ranked Golden Flashes, who had taken two-of-three from the Falcons in 2009. Kent State finished one game behind the Falcons in the MAC standings last year after ranking second in the conference in team pitching as well as in team batting, finishing behind Bowling Green.

Another Horizon League team will come to the Falcons’ territory when the Penguins of Youngstown State come to Steller Field on May 18. Despite a 16-35 record a season ago, the Penguins return six of eight regular position players from their starting lineup and all three of their starting pitchers from last season.

“I think year in and year out there are some outstanding teams,” said Schmitz on the quality of MAC baseball this year. “Kent State as well as OU will be very strong again this year. Miami (OH) was a little young last year, but they’ve gained a lot of experience. We finished off the season with Akron and had a heck of a battle with them for three games and we expect Akron to be very much improved. You really have to bring the ‘A-game’ this year.”

This year the Mid-American Conference Tournament will be held in Chillicothe, Ohio at VA Memorial Stadium. Should the Falcons win a bid to be in field of eight MAC teams to participate in the tournament, they will return to the same field that they are scheduled to play West Virginia earlier in the season.

(Release)

By CB360 Editor Sean Stires

Cliff Lee (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

their first championship in nine years, it was a former college pitcher that stole the show in game one of the 2009 World Series.

Former Arkansas standout, Cliff Lee, struckout 10 with no walks in a complete game 6-1 win to give Philadelphia a 1-0 lead in the series.  Lee’s former Cleveland Indians teammate, C.C. Sabathia was touched for two runs in 7.0 IP and suffered the loss.  Both runs were courtesy of a pair of home runs by Chase Utley-who starred in college at UCLA.

“I really never have been nervous in the big leagues”, Lee told Fox after the game when asked about nerves facing the vaunted Yankee line-up in his first World Series start.  “Workin’ ahead, mixin’ speeds and stayin’ out of the heart of the plate”, is what Lee said was the key to

Chase Utley

keeping New York in check all night.

“It’s a tough line-up to pitch to.  If you make them keep it in the yard you’re doin’ pretty good”, he added.  Lee’s ten strikeouts were one away from his career-high.  He threw 80 of his 122 pitches for strikes.  Yankee third baseman Alex Rodriguez accounted for three of Lee’s ten punch-outs.

Another Philladelphia former college player, Ryan Howard (Southwest Missouri State), had a pair of doubles with an RBI in the game one victory.

MANHATTAN, Kan. - A 13-game homestand during the month of March and 29 games against 2009 NCAA Regional competition highlight Kansas State’s slate as head coach Brad Hill released the Wildcats’ 2010 baseball schedule on Thursday.

Complete 2010 Kansas State Schedule (PDF)

“This will be a challenging schedule,” Hill said. “We open the season with 12 games on the road and will take on 10 NCAA Regional teams from a year ago, including three in our first homestand. The nonconference schedule will help prepare our young squad for the always challenging Big 12 Conference.”

Kansas State Head Coach Brad Hill

The 2009 season opens on Friday, Feb. 19, at The Citadel Memorial Challenge against Delaware. The Cats then face East Tennessee State on Saturday before taking on the host school, The Citadel, on Sunday. K-State will then stay in Charleston, S.C., to face the Bulldogs for an extra game on Monday, Feb. 22.

Kansas State travels to Florida to play eight games in nine days, beginning with the Russmatt Central Florida Invitational at Chain of Lakes Park – the former spring training home of the Cleveland Indians – in Winter Haven, Fla. The Cats will play five games in the invitational, which runs Saturday, February 27 through Wednesday, March 3. K-State will play against a combination of teams in Duquesne, Illinois State, Maine, Northeastern, St. Bonaventure, Valparaiso, Villanova and Western Michigan. The exact schedule for the tournament will be released at a later date.

Following a day off on Thursday, K-State will participate in the Bright House Invitational, hosted by Stetson, beginning Friday, March 5, in DeLand, Fla. The Wildcats will face the Hatters on Friday before squaring off against Notre Dame on Saturday. Kansas State will finish its Florida excursion and 12-game road trip to start the season on Sunday against Harvard. The 12-game road trip is the longest to start a season since 1972.

Kansas State will open its home slate with season-long 13-game homestand beginning on Friday, March 12, against Kent State. The Cats continue their series with the Golden Flashes with a Saturday doubleheader at 12 p.m., while the series finale is scheduled for Sunday at 1 p.m. Following a home contest against Creighton on Tuesday, March 16, the Cats will play another four-game weekend series beginning on Friday, March 19, against UW-Milwaukee.

The season-long homestand also sees the start of Big 12 play for Kansas State as the Wildcats welcome Oklahoma State to Tointon Family Stadium for a three-game series beginning Friday, March 26, at 6:30 p.m. The homestand and the month of March concludes with a visit from in-state rival Wichita State on Tuesday, March 30.

K-State’s first conference road trip is to Lubbock, Texas, as the Cats face Texas Tech, April 1-3, before coming home to take on Nebraska, April 9-11.

K-State, which traveled to BYU two years ago and played the Cougars last season in Manhattan, will travel to Provo, Utah, for a two-game series against the Mountain West Conference school on April 13 and 14.

Following a three-game home conference series against 2009 NCAA Regional participant Baylor, April 16-18, the Cats travel to Eck Stadium in Wichita to conclude their season series against the Shockers on Tuesday, April 20. K-State will then stay on the road as it travels to Columbia, Mo., to face Missouri, April 23-25.

The Wildcats will face Chicago State, Tuesday and Wednesday, April 27 and 28, in Manhattan, before traveling to Oklahoma to end April and begin May as they play the Sooners Friday, April 30, through Sunday, May 2.

The final stretches of the season see Kansas State at home for seven of its final 11 games. The Wildcats will step out of conference play for the final time in 2010 as it hosts 2009 NCAA Regional participant and Big Ten member Minnesota, Tuesday and Wednesday, May 4 and 5.

College World Series runner-up Texas comes calling for a three-game weekend series in Manhattan beginning Friday, May 7.

The Cats will renew their in-state rivalry against Kansas beginning Friday, May 14, in Lawrence, before the series shifts to Manhattan for the Saturday and Sunday contests.  The Jayhawks are another 2009 NCAA Regional team.

Kansas State’s regular season concludes in College Station, Texas, with a three-game series at Texas A&M, beginning Friday, May 21.

The 2010 Big 12 Championship will be conducted May 26-30 at Bricktown Ballpark in Oklahoma City, Okla., while NCAA Regionals will run June 4-7 at 16 various on-campus sites throughout the country.