• Sacramento State (6-4) completes a season-long nine-game road trip this week when the team travels to San Luis Obispo for a three-game series at Cal Poly (2-8) on Saturday and Sunday.
• The Hornets and Mustangs will play a doubleheader Saturday at 1 p.m., followed by a single game Sunday at 11 a.m.
• The Hornets are coming off a three-day tournament in Honolulu in which the team went 3-3. Sacramento State won its first three games of the event, before dropping its final three.
• The Hornets are 22-26 all-time vs. Cal Poly, including a 1-0 home loss in last year's season opener.
• Cal Poly is not streaming any of the three games this weekend, but is offering live stats.
• This weekend marks the first of three non-conference three-game series the Hornets will play this season - Mar. 15-16 at Oregon State; Mar. 22-23 at home vs. Loyola Marymount.
• Through 10 games, the Hornets' offense has been the catalyst as the team is hitting .293 with 10 doubles, 13 home runs, 53 RBIs, a .498 slugging percentage and .880 ops.
• The Hornets lead the Big Sky in a number of offensive categories, including home runs, homers per game (1.30), slugging percentage and stolen bases (20).
• In fact, the Hornets rank 19th in the nation in home runs and 21st in homers per game. In addition, the team is 37th in stolen bases per contest (2.00).
• As a comparison, Hornet opponents have hit just two home runs all season.
• Sacramento State's coaching staff likes to pinch run, as the team has already used a pinch runner on 20 occasions. Of those 20 appearances, pinch runners have scored 14 times.
• Sacramento State is 20-for-23 in stolen base opportunities as the team has more speed on the base paths than it has in recent memory. Three players already have at least four steals, including
Lafulafu Malepeai (5-for-5),
Faith Epperson (4-for-5) and
Gwen Ludwig (4-for-5). In total, nine different Hornets have at least one stolen base.
• Thus far, in the early going, senior left-hander
Caroline Evans has established herself as the ace of the staff, leading the team in virtually every statistical category. She is 2-1 with a 1.44 ERA and has 28 strikeouts in 24.1 innings. In addition, Evans has walked just five batters, and her 5.60 strikeout to walk ratio easily leads the Big Sky Conference.
• Junior
Katie Marsh continues to be the offensive catalyst as she leads the team in batting average (.462), hits (12), doubles (3), home runs (4), slugging percentage (1.115) and ops (1.648). She has a team-high five multiple-hit games, and is averaging one homer every 6.5 at-bats. She already has more home runs (4) than her first two years combined (3) with the program.
•
Andrea Lira hit safely the first eight games of the season, and had a 16-game hitting streak dating back to last year. However, that streak ended in an 0-for-4 on Saturday vs. Utah Tech. The 16-game hit streak was one game shy of cracking the top five for longest Hornet hit streak.
• After missing all of last season with injury, junior left fielder
Lafulafu Malepeai is hitting .364, and has hit safely in seven of the 10 games this season.
• Malepeai is one of just four Hornets to start every game this season, joining right fielder
Andrea Lira, third baseman
Nikki Barboza, and shortstop
Gwen Ludwig.
• Of
Nikki Barboza's team-high 11 RBIs, six came in one game. In the Hornets' 11-10 eight-inning win over Utah Tech, she posted career highs in hits (4-for-5), home runs (2) and RBIs (6). That included a walk-off RBI-single in the bottom of the eighth to deliver the victory.
• The opposition has 27 two-out RBIs this season, and is hitting .310 (31-for-100) with two outs.
• Offensively, Sacramento State is 6-for-8 against left-hand pitching this season.
• Head coach
Lori Perez is just 16 wins shy of notching her 300th career head coaching victory.
