Southeastern sweeps weekly Southland baseball awards

HAMMOND, La. – Southeastern Louisiana swept the weekly conference awards with Tyler Finke being named the Southland Conference Hitter of the Week and Will Warren being named the Southland Conference Pitcher of the Week, the league office announced Monday. The awards are presented by Hercules Tires.

Both set the tone for a four-game sweep of Stephen F. Austin with standout performances in the series opener. Warren struck out a career-high 11 over 6.1 innings of one-run ball and Finke put the game out of reach with a two-run home run in the fifth inning, staking the Lions to a 4-0 lead in the 6-2 victory.

In the second game of Saturday’s doubleheader, Finke put the Lions on the board with a two-run double down the left-field line.

The sophomore center fielder from Columbus, Indiana threw a runner out at the plate in the second inning of Sunday’s first game, preventing SFA from taking an early lead. He later provided a sixth-inning sac fly for RBI No. 5 and then scored the final run of a three-run eighth, securing the extra-inning victory.

He recorded an RBI base hit as part of a 2-for-4 performance in the series finale, finishing as the team leader with six RBIs four and steals.

Finke turned in a pair of multi-hit performances over the weekend, picking up at least one hit, one RBI and a stolen base in each game of the series.

Warren fanned at least one batter during every inning in which he appeared, striking out a pair in each of the first three and retiring the first seven batters of the ballgame.

The junior from Brandon, Mississippi is the third different Lion pitcher to win the award in the last four weeks, following freshmen Will Kinzeler and Brennan Stuprich. With a 6-1 record, Warren moves into a tie for the Southland lead in wins.

Southland weekly award winners are nominated and voted upon by each school’s sports information director. Voting for one’s own athlete is not permitted. To earn honorable mention, a student-athlete must appear on 25 percent of ballots.

UP NEXT
Conference-leading Southeastern (24-12, 17-7 SLC) continues its road trip next weekend, traveling to the New Orleans lakefront for a four-game series against second-place UNO (20-16, 15-9 SLC) at Maestri Field. Games in the Pontchartrain Bowl rivalry series are scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Friday, a doubleheader starting at 2 p.m. Saturday and a single game at 1 p.m. Sunday.

The first game of Saturday’s doubleheader is slated to be a seven-inning contest. If the first game goes extra innings, the second game would then become a seven-inning affair.