RICHMOND, Ky. - Buoyed by a three-game sweep of Furman University last weekend in Greenville, SC, coach Jim Ward's Eastern Kentucky University Colonel baseball team travels to the state of Georgia to play at Mercer University in Macon Friday and at Georgia Southern University in Statesboro Saturday and Sunday.

EKU opened its 1999 season last weekend with wins over Furman by scores of 10-6, 9-7 and 7-2. The Colonels return a veteran team that includes seven returning position starters in the lineup.

"Overall, we were obviously well-pleased with the results in our games against Furman," said Ward. "Our pitching was adequate, our hitting was good (.314 team batting average), our defense was excellent and our baserunning was very good (13 stolen bases in the three-game set).

"I believe a lot of our success last weekend had to do with our ability to go outside and get in some quality preparation work on our field. Our defense was especially impressive at Furman because of this," Ward added.

Senior rightfielder Sean Murray led the Colonels at the plate against Furman as he went 7-12 (.583 batting average) with four doubles, four runs scored, three stolen bases and three runs batted in. Second baseman/designated hitter Adam Basil and first baseman Lee Chapman hit .400, centerfielder Brad Sizemore hit .364, shortstop Kiley Vaughn batted .333 and leftfielder Tom White hit .308 on the trip.

Picking up wins on the mound for the Colonels were junior Mike Martini, freshman Chip Albright and junior Corey Eagle.

"Our objectives for this coming weekend are to build the endurance of our pitchers 15-20 pitches each and to cut down on strikeouts with better two-strike adjustments by our hitters. The chemistry on the ballclub is good. We're basically a junior-senior team that, of course, is more mature and confident than last year," Ward said.

Eastern's pitching rotation for the weekend set includes senior righthander Eric Bess on Friday at Mercer, Eagle on Saturday vs. Georgia Southern and Albright on Sunday at GSU.

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