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Rice
Baseball preview: vs. No. 23 Rice [Feb 17-19]
02.17.2017 | Baseball
The Longhorns open the 2017 season against the Rice Owls in David Pierce's first game as Texas head coach.
TEXAS vs. No. 23 RICE
February 17-19, 2017
Where: UFCU Disch-Falk Field, Austin, Texas
Time: Friday at 6:30 p.m., Saturday (DH) at 3 p.m., Sunday at 12 p.m.
TV: Longhorn Network—Lowell Galindo (Play-by-Play), Keith Moreland (Analyst), Greg Swindell (Analyst)
Radio: 104.9 FM The Horn/1260 AM—Craig Way (Play-by-Play), Bill Little (Analyst)
Live stats: sidearmstats.com/texas/baseball
All-time series: Texas leads, 225-56-2
Complete Game Notes
PROBABLE STARTING PITCHERS
FRIDAY Rice RHP Dane Myers (2016: 1-2, 6.68 ERA ) vs. Texas RHP Morgan Cooper (2016: 3-5, 4.03 ERA)
SATURDAY G1 Rice RHP Ricardo Salinas (9-2, 3.39) vs. Texas RHP Kyle Johnston (3-2, 3.72)
SATURDAY G2 Rice TBD vs. Texas RHP Blair Henley (n/a)
SUNDAY Rice TBD vs. Texas TBD
SERIES NOTES
THE MATCHUP—Texas leads the all-time series, 225-56-2…the last time the Owls visited Austin was April 8, 2014 for a Tuesday night matchup…Rice took that game 7-2 over the Longhorns…the last meeting between the two sides came in 2015 when the squads split a four-game series, winning two games apiece.
A NEW CHAPTER—Friday marks David Pierce's first game at the helm of the Texas Baseball program…Pierce was named head coach on June 29, 2016, making him just the fifth Longhorn head coach since 1911 (with the exception of the war years of 1943-45 when Blair Cherry was at the helm) and the 13th head coach in 122 years of Texas baseball…Pierce—along with assistant coach Sean Allen, assistant coach Philip Miller and volunteer coach Phil Haig—came to Texas after two years at Tulane and three years at Sam Houston State.
RICE CONNECTION—Pierce spent nine years as an assistant under Rice head coach Wayne Graham from 2002 to 2011…the Owls reached the NCAA tournament in each of those seasons, made four trips to the College World Series and earned one National Championship in that time…Graham spent two seasons (1956-57) as a player at Texas under legendary Longhorns head coach Bibb Falk.
A LOOK AT THE OWLS—Rice enters the regular season ranked No. 23 by D1Baseball.com…the Owls finished last season ranked No. 20 after falling one win shy of an NCAA Super Regional.
NEXT UP—Texas will head to Sam Houston State on Tuesday, marking the Longhorns' first ever trip to Huntsville…the Bearkats captured the Southland Conference regular season and tournament championship in 2016 and are favored to win the league once again according to the preseason poll.
LONGHORNS IN THE DRAFT—Texas returns eight of its nine starting position players from last season after C Tres Barrera was drafted in the sixth round by the Washington Nationals…among starting pitchers, all return with the exception of LHP Ty Culbreth who graduated and was drafted in the eighth round by the Colorado Rockies.
FENCES FORWARD—UFCU Disch-Falk Field saw some renovations this winter as a new FieldTurf was installed and the outfield dimensions have been changed…the left-field line remains 340', center field remains '400 and the park remains 325' down the right-field line, however, the left-center field gap moves from 384' to 370' and the right-center field gap moves from 384' to 365'.
D1 POWER RANKINGS—Several Longhorns appeared in the D1Baseball.com position power rankings…RHP Morgan Cooper (No. 15), RHP Kyle Johnston (No. 61), Nolan Kingham (No. 128) and RHP Connor Mayes (No. 135) were ranked among starting pitchers…RHP Chase Shugart (No. 36) made this list of relievers…OF Patrick Mathis ranked No. 35 among D1 outfielders…INF Bret Boswell (No. 46) made the third basemen list, INF/OF Zane Gurwitz ranked No. 32 among second basemen and 1B/RHP Kacy Clemens ranked No. 42 on the first basemen list…RHP Blair Henley (No. 90) and INF David Hamilton (No. 99) made the Top 100 Freshman rankings.
D1 PREVIEW—Texas is projected to finish fourth in the Big 12 according to the D1Baseball.com staff, with RHP Morgan Cooper selected as the preseason Pitcher of the Year favorite…in D1Baseball's Top Prospects (2017 Draft) list, four Texas players ranked in the top seven—RHP Morgan Cooper (No. 1), RHP Kyle Johnston (No. 3), OF Patrick Mathis (No. 6) and INF Bret Boswell (No. 7).
PRESEASON POLL—In the Big 12 preseason coaches' poll, Texas was selected to finish fourth behind preseason favorite TCU (64), Oklahoma State (54) and Texas Tech (48), all three of whom reached the College World Series last season…a different league team has won each of the past six Big 12 titles with Texas the last squad to repeat as regular season champions (2009-11).
RANKED OPPONENTS—The Longhorns' schedule includes matchups against No. 1 TCU, No. 13 UL Lafayette, No. 14 Texas Tech, No. 20 Texas A&M and No. 23 Rice, ranked according to the D1Baseball.com preseason poll.
HAPPY AT HOME—Twenty-one of the Longhorns first 27 games are set to take place at home in Austin…the only road games in that time come at Sam Houston State (Feb 22), Stanford (March 2-5) and Texas State (March 21)…overall, Texas plays just 20 of its 54 games away from UFCU Disch-Falk Field…among those 20 games is a March 28 game against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi held at Whataburger Field in Corpus Christi and an April 25 game against Louisiana at Constellation Field in Sugar Land.
WATCH 'EM—All but one Longhorns home games at UFCU Disch-Falk Field will be shown on Longhorn Network…Lowell Galindo will take over play-by-play duties this season while former Longhorn greats Keith Moreland and Greg Swindell will handle the color analyst duties…both broadcasters have their numbers retired at UFCU Disch-Falk Field…when Texas hosts Oklahoma on April 7, FOX Sports 1 will take over the broadcast as a part of its season-long Big 12 schedule.
HEAR 'EM—In partnership with IMG-College, Texas home games will be broadcast on the Austin Radio Network, primarily on 104.9 The Horn and AM 1260.
