Baseball | 2/21/2020 8:38:00 AM

STORM LAKE, Iowa (February 21, 2020) - The Buena Vista University baseball team gets set to throw the first pitch of its 2020 campaign this weekend when it takes on Hamline University down in Topeka, Kan.  

THE MATCH-UP
Saturday, February 22 | Buena Vista (0-0) vs Hamline University (0-0)  12 p.m. (DH) | Topkea, Kan. | Bettis Sports Complex
Sunday, February 23 | Buena Vista (0-0) vs Hamline University (0-0) 12 p.m. (1-game) | Topeka, Kan. | Bettis Sports Complex

SCOUTING HAMLINE
The Pipers, members of the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) finished 17-22 overall a season ago while going 8-12 in league play.  They split a pair of doubleheaders with BVU a season ago while going 3-4 against Luther.  The team will have to replace its top offensive threat, Nolan Schoonveld, who hit .356 as a senior last season and had a team-leading 52 hits.  He was also one of the team's top pitchers, going 3-4 with a 3.52 ERA over 46 innings.  It does, however, return junior Cullen Buck, who was second on the team in hits (47) and the team leader in RBI (29).

The team does have a group of veteran arms returning to the mound this season despite losing two of its top pitchers to graduation.  Senior Jake Dujomvic  is one of three players back that started six games on the hill in 2019, along with junior Will Tzvaras, who was the top arm out of the bullpen.  As a staff, the Pipers posted an ERA of 4.82 over 315 innings of work.

2019 IN REVIEW
The Beavers caught fire late in the regular season to win 10 of their final 11 regular season games, including a sweep of the University of Dubuque at home in the regular season finale which ultimately pushed them into a second-place finish in the American Rivers Conference.  The that momentum didn't stop their as it rolled to three straight wins in the A-R-C Tournament to earn an automatic berth into the NCAA Regional Tournament.  BVU went 1-2 at the regional which ended with a tough 11-5 loss against the host school and second-ranked Concordia-Chicago.  BVU ended the season at 26-19 overall and 15-9 in league play.

BVU was able to string together those wins late in the year with a combination of timely hitting and some of the best pitching efforts in program history.  The Beavers rolled off an unprecedented string of 41.1 innings of scoreless ball which began on the final weekend of the regular season and lasted into the sixth inning of the tournament championship contest.  Gage Smart anchored the bullpen and tied a school single-season record with eight saves and was a Second Team All-Conference selection.  The accolades didn't stop there for him, as he was later named a Second Team All-American by both D3baseball.com and the ABCA.  Bryce Rheault was the A-R-C Position Player of the Year as well as the Central Region Player of the Year by the ABCA.  He was later tabbed as a Second Team All-American by the ABCA and an Honorable Mention selection by D3baseball.com.  For the year, he set a new single-season school record with 75 base hits.

Egan Bonde led the pitching staff with six wins while Smart, along with Tyler Tennyson each followed with five.  As a unit, the Beavers posted a team ERA of 3.91 and four shutouts in nearly 390 total innings.  Smart's ERA of 1.14 was sixth-best in = Division III while his WHIP of 0.70 led the nation.  Rheault tied for 10th in hits.

PREVIEWING 2020
The Beavers lose some key parts of last year's late-season magical run, but the team does have several veteran parts returning, led by Smart and Rheault, who are pre-season All-Americans entering their senior campaigns.  Aside from Rheault, three of the team's top-four hitters return to help lead an offense that hit .295 overall and posted a slugging percentage of nearly .400.  Smart will help lead a strong returning corps of arms on the mound despite the loss of Bonde to graduation.  The team has six hurlers returning that threw at least 20 innings a season ago.  Senior Tyler Tennyson and junior Nick Henrichs each started 10 games last season and are the top-two returning individuals in innings pitched.  Tennyson posted a 2.67 ERA in over 60 innings while going 5-2.  His 38 strikeouts were third-most on the staff.  Henrichs had three wins in over 58 innings with an ERA of 3.72.  Overall, the Beavers struck out 286 batters and allowed just 158 walks.  

Senior Joe Rock (.377) joins Rheault as the only other player to hit over .300 a season ago.  The lefty first-baseman was third on the team with 52 hits and tied for second with 28 RBI.  Tyler Stoltze, along with Henrichs, finished with over 40 hits, with both finishing tied with Rock in RBI.  Tennyson's 12 doubles were second-most on the team.

Defensively, the Beavers were among the best in the A-R-C.  The team finished 2019 with a .961 fielding percentage which was third-best in the league.  It was second in total assists and tops in the league with 32 double plays turned.  Rheault is among the top returning middle infielder's in the conference as he was involved with a team-high 25 of those double plays.  The team loses just one infield position player (Noah Paper) and one outfielder (Peyton Renning) to graduation.  Junior Coleman Roberts led all outfielders on the team in assists (3).

COACHING MILESTONE
This year marks the 20th season at the helm for BVU head coach, Steve Eddie, who has chalked up over 430 career victories with the Beavers and a pair of conference tournament championships.

AROUND THE A-R-C
Buena Vista was picked by the league coaches to finish second in the A-R-C standings this season as a result of votes from the Preseason Coaches Poll.  The Beavers picked up a pair of first-place votes and totaled 58 points overall to finish just behind league favorite, Coe College, which tallied seven first-place votes and 63 total points.

2020 SCHEDULE
The Beavers begin the season this weekend with a three-game weekend series in Topeka, Kan., against Hamline University before returning to the same location next weekend for a four-game weekend set against Grinnell College.  After a 10-day break, the team then plays seven games down in Tucson, Ariz. from March 11-18 over Spring Break.  It then returns home and quickly shifts its focus to the start of American Rivers Conference play which opens in Storm Lake against Simpson College on Friday, March 20.  BVU also plays weekend home series against Luther, Coe and Central.