St. Cloud State and Central Oklahoma Set for First Round Matchup in NCAA Tournament

Thursday, May 16

Warrensburg, Mo.

7:00 p.m.

St. Cloud State

University of Central Oklahoma

Mitch Mallek, NCAA DII Central Region Batting Practice

Mitch Mallek leads the Huskies in hits (73), batting average (.382), RBI's (48) and HR (12)

Photo by: Zach Siggelkow

St. Cloud State and Central Oklahoma Set for First Round Matchup in NCAA Tournament

5/16/2019 9:00:00 AM | Baseball

SCSU serves as the #3 seed while UCO is the #6 seed, a reversal of last year's ranks in the regional tournament

WARRENSBURG, MO. - In a rematch of last year's NCAA Tournament first round match up, the St. Cloud State baseball team (40-12, 26-8 NSIC) and Central Oklahoma will square off on Thursday, May 16 at 7 PM CT at Central Missouri's Crane Stadium.

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The Huskies defeated the Bronchos 5-2 in last year's first round meeting. Dominic Austing tossed a stellar 8 2/3 innings before Sheldon Miks recorded the final out of the game to pick up the save. Austing struck out 12 and only allowed two runs on three hits in his seventh win of the season. Caeden Harris and Jordan Joseph each tallied a pair of hits to total four of SCSU's seven hits, while Harris also recorded two RBI's.

St. Cloud State enters their fifth consecutive NCAA tournament with a team .318 batting average and 3.00 team ERA. Mitch Mallek paces the Huskies' lineup with a .382 average while Mathew Meyer and Jordan Joseph both own a .352 mark. Of note, both Meyer and Joseph have 69 hits this season.
Dominic Austing, a D2CCA Central Region 1st Team Honoree, has been the ace of SCSU's staff with a 1.97 ERA through 59 1/3 innings thus far. The senior right-hander is 8-0 and has struck out 78 while only walking 18.
Blake Flint and Sheldon Miks have each thrown over 60 innings while the duo have also totaled at least 65 strikeouts each.

The #3 Huskies and #6 Bronchos will square off in the second game of the NCAA DII Central Region Bracket II following the completion of game one between #2 Central Missouri and #7 Missouri Southern State. A spot in the NCAA DII Central Super Regional round is on the line, where the winner of the Super Regional will advance to the 2019 NCAA DII World Series in Cary, North Carolina.