Diamond Dogs Open 2010 Season Friday With Rhode Island
STARKVILLE, Miss. - Mississippi State raises the curtains on its 120th season of baseball Friday when the Bulldogs take on first-time foe Rhode Island in a 4 p.m. game at Dudy Noble Field.
The game opens a three-game series with the Rams and a season-opening 13-game home stand for State. The MSU-URI series continues Saturday with a 2 p.m. game and concludes Sunday with a 1:30 p.m. contest.
Stadium gates and the Dudy Noble Field ticket office will open two hours prior to each game this season. General admission tickets for non-conference games are priced at $5, while tickets for SEC games are $10 for general admission and $15 for grandstand chairback seats, when available.
Sophomore left-hander Nick Routt (Silver Spring, Md.), who last year became the first MSU pitcher to earn SEC All-Freshman Team honors, will open on the mound in Friday's season-opener. Routt posted a 5-3 record and led the MSU pitching staff with a 4.15 ERA, 86.2 innings pitched, 87 strikeouts and a league-leading four complete games.
Rhode Island posted a school-record 37-20-1 record last year, taking runner-up honors in the 14-team Atlantic 10 Conference and just missing a berth in the 2009 NCAA Tournament. The Rams, coached by Jim Foster, return seven starting position players and seven pitchers from their 2009 club.
Head coach John Cohen, who earned All-SEC accolades during a stellar three-year playing career at Mississippi State (1988-90), enters his second season as State's skipper and his 11th as a collegiate head coach.
The 2010 Bulldog team features 17 returning lettermen, among them nine seniors and 14 of the 27 players that drew starts for the Bulldogs during the 2009 campaign. The MSU roster also features 18 newcomers from a recruiting class that was ranked as the nation's eighth-best by Baseball America.
The radio broadcast of Friday's game will be carried locally by WFCA-FM (107.9) while the Saturday and Sunday broadcasts will be available at no cost on internet (www.MStateAthletics.com).
Additionally, live video streaming of six of MSU's first seven games will also be available at no cost on the Maroon to the Max extension of the athletics department website. Sunday's series-ending MSU-Rhode Island game will be available on an audio-only basis.
MSU continues to approach a school record for baseball season ticket sales. With sales continuing into the season, the MSU Athletic Ticket Office reported the sale of 5,462 baseball season ticket through Feb. 17. It's the fourth-highest season ticket sales total at MSU and just 134 away from the school-record 5,596 total in 2002.