Issue date: 4/8/09 Section: Sports

Freshman catcher Gerik Wallsten, left, and senior second baseman Jordan Tokarz, right, high five following Wallsten scoring a run during the home game against Murray State on Saturday at Coaches Stadium. (Audrey Sawyer/The Daily Eastern News)

Eastern sophomore ace right-hander Mike Recchia will get the start Wednesday as the Eastern baseball team will look to extend its 11-game winning streak against Indiana State at 2 p.m. at Coaches Stadium.

While Recchia has been the most consistent arm in the Panthers' rotation all season - compiling a 0.92 ERA while going 5-0 thus far - head coach Jim Schmitz said he hopes to get five or six pitchers some action Wednesday, and Recchia will likely only pitch two or three innings.

Red-shirt freshman Mike Martin, sophomore Matt Miller, senior Jordan Kreke, junior Richie Derbak and senior Brian Morrell will all see action against the Sycamores.

Schmitz said he was searching for a few more reliable arms in his bullpen earlier in the season and appears to have found them in the pitchers who will see action Wednesday.

"Morrell is our first guy up, and he's gotten in and pitched well. He gets ground ball after ground ball and that's what we like about him," Schmitz said. "The next couple of weeks we're really going to try and extend all those guys because on the weekends, we've really only been throwing four or five guys."

The Eastern pitching staff leads the Ohio Valley Conference in ERA (4.34) and rank 47th in the country.

The Panthers dropped a 10-9 contest to Indiana State on March 10 in Terre Haute, Ind. They blew an early 6-2 lead and walked nine total batters in the game, something Schmitz said he was not happy with.

"The nine walks was obviously a problem," he said. "I don't know (Indiana State's) record, but I know their coach has done a really good job over there. The last two years have been close games."

Offensively, the Panthers are look ing to keep their hot hitting going, led by senior center fielder Brett Nommensen. Nommensen was named the Ohio Valley Conference Player of the Week Monday and leads the nation in both slugging percentage and on base percentage. He leads the OVC in batting average and home runs as well.

After Wednesday's game the Panthers travel to Martin, Tenn., for a three-game series against Tennessee Martin. The series will be played on Friday and Saturday instead of the usual weekend series, which run on Saturday and Sunday to accommodate Easter. Friday's doubleheader starts at 1 p.m. and Saturday's series finale is scheduled for 1 p.m.


Collin Whitchurch can be reached at 581-7944 or cfwhitchurch@eiu.edu.

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