April 7, 2004

LAS VEGAS - After dropping two-of-three on the road at San Diego State this weekend, the Rebel baseball team (20-10, 7-2 MWC) will try to stay atop the Mountain West Conference standings, as they play host to the Cougars of BYU (13-22, 3-6 MWC) in a three-game series beginning at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday night.

Senior shortstop Peter White has taken over the team lead offensively. White is hitting a club-leading .410 with 6 home runs. Senior second baseman Ryan Ruiz has continued his solid play, hitting .404 with 36 RBI and 4 home runs. Senior center fielder Brent Johnson is hitting .383 and leads the club with 42 RBI.

On the mound, the Rebels have gotten solid innings from southpaw reliever Ben Schienbaum, who has lowered his ERA to 2.84 with 21 strikeouts in 25.1 innings of work. Among starters, Jake Vose sports a 4-2 record with a 4.50 ERA, Matt Luca is 5-2 with 57 strikeouts, and David Seccombe is 4-1 with a 5.68 ERA.

BYU is lead by designated hitter Jeff Hiestand, who's .312 average leads all Cougar batters. The Cougars are getting much of their offensive production from shortstop Brandon Taylor who leads BYU in both homeruns (7), and RBI (25).

The Cougar probable rotation consists of LHP Patrick Wells (4-3, 5.37 ERA), RHP Paul Jacinto (0-7, 5.68 ERA), and RHP Justin Su'a (2-1, 4.72 ERA).

The game times for this weekend's series will be: Thursday at 6:30 p.m., Friday at 6:30 p.m., and Saturday at 2:00 p.m. All three games will be broadcast live on KSHP AM 1400 and via internet gametracker at www.unlvrebels.com.

The Rebels will remain at home to face Arizona in a two-game series April 13-14 before returning to conference play as they head to Salt Lake City on April 16-18, to take on Utah in a three-game series.

Game Notes in PDF Format
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