The Horned Frog baseball team faces the University of Nevada, Las Vegas in a three-game series starting today, between squads currently tied for second place in the Mountain West Conference.
TCU’s sweep of conference foe Air Force moved the Horned Frogs (20-12, 5-4) into a four-way tie for second place in the conference with UNLV (14-16, 5-4), the University of New Mexico 21-12, 5-4) and Brigham Young University (14-18, 5-4) behind front-runner San Diego State (18-15, 6-3).
This is the second three-games series of the season between TCU and UNLV. The two teams met at the end of March in TCU’s second conference series of the season.
The Horned Frogs took the first game 6-2 behind a complete game win from sophomore Tyler Lockwood. However, UNLV won the series by taking the next two games, both by the score of 7-6.
Both losses came off of walk-off runs for the Rebels. In the first game, TCU led 6-5 entering the bottom of the eighth but surrendered a walk-off home run by UNLV sophomore Jarred Frierson in the bottom of the ninth after the Rebels tied the game in the previous inning.
The second game was tied entering the bottom of the ninth, and a TCU error provided the Rebels with their winning run.
Since the Horned Frogs’ two loses to the Runnin’ Rebels, they have not lost a game, reeling off six-straight wins.
The Horned Frogs swept the Runnin’ Rebels last year 4-0. TCU scored 36 runs in the series last year, including the highest scoring games of its season, a 16-12 win.
The Rebels’ propensity for allowing high-scoring games has not changed much this season. Over its past six games, UNLV has surrendered 78 runs, including a 23-1 loss to the University of Nevada, Reno and a 21-12 loss to BYU.
Conversely, TCU is on its best stretch of the year, sweeping its season series against Baylor University and winning its first conference series against Air Force in sweep fashion.
TCU’s pitching staff has been on target during its winning streak, holding opponents to three runs or less in five of its last six wins.
