McNeese State University - Log Yearbook (Lake Charles, LA)

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Catch the Fever the team were Jimmy Ricklef- sen with five, David Hartman with four, Mike Abshire and Troy Dodd with two apiece, and Keith Greene and Joe Pantoja with one apiece. It was quite a year for both Bond and Dodd. Bond played in all of McNeese'’s tilts, alter- nating between second base and the outfield, and led the team with a .333 batting aver- age. He was also tops in runs batted in with 31, in base hits with 42 and in runs scored with 26. Dodd spent some early games on the bench with an injury, but in 20 games posted a healthy .453 average with 12 RBIs. Nipping at the heels of a .300 batting average were Gueits and Pucci, both with .284 marks. 168 Sports Ricklefsen and Greene were battling for the team stolen base title, the former with 11 and the latter with 10. Pucci led in doubles with eight and both he and Newkirk were sec- ond in runs batted in with 23 apiece. Heading into the stretch run of the SLC round robin, McNeese had a 5-5-1 re- cord and was only three games off the pace of defend- ing champion Lamar. The Pokes bowed in a three game series with the Cardinals but had a three-game series remaining with Louisiana Tech, which was in second place and only one-half game in back of Lamar. Over all, the Cowboys re- cord stood at 18-19-1, with 14 of those victories chalked up by the hurling foursome of Jon Continued Facing the nationally ranked Tigers of LSU, Junior accounting major Curt Leger readies himself for some tough competition. (Photo by G. Ed- wards) In a watchful silence, the McNee' Cowboys concentrate on the acti between fellow team members a the Indians of Dallas Baptist. (Pho by D. Smith)

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Houston native Jimmy Rickelfsen, the team’s leading base stealer, trots back to second base after an unsuccessful attempt to steal third. (Photo by G. Edwards) Catcher Kenny Miller of Spring, Tex- as, shouts encouragement from the bench during the contest with the LSU Tigers. The Pokes defeated the 12th ranked Tigers 3-2. (Photo by D. Smith) Despite a poor season on the road, beating nationally-ranked teams at home made McNeese baseball fans Catch the Fever The Cowboys went for dis- tance hitting in 1985 and turned the season into a home-run-hitting affair. Not only did the squad set a school record for home runs in a single season but it also set a Southland Conference stan- dard for homers per game. Probably the keynote of the entire year for the Cowboys was the squad's ability to come through against its toughest competition. On two separate occasions they battled nationally ranked teams and won. LSU faced the Cowboy team in early April with a No. 12 ranking nationally, but the Pokes picked off a 3-2 victory. In mid-April Tulane, which had been ranked No. 20, visited for a twinbill. That turned out to be a sweep for the Pokes as they hammered out 19 hits in win- ning 11-6 and 9-6, the victory margin in the latter game com- ing on — what else — a three run homer by Eddie Gueits. Through 38 games, McNeese had blasted out 42 home runs for a SLC record- setting average of 1.1 per- game. Even though the team still had 11 games remaining, there was no chance of col- lecting the SLC single season record of 71 homers, which had been set by Lamar, but the team did have a chance to snap the home runs per game record. Home runs weren't just the product of one player during the year as a total of 11 players got into the act. And, in mia- April, the SLC statistical sur- vey had three of the Cowboys ranked one-two-three in the league's home run derby. Kevin Newkirk was the top producer with eight, while both Dino Pucci and Terry Bond had slapped seven and Eddie Gueits was another step behind with six. Other h ome run hitters on Continued Baseball 167

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Compiling facts and figures for fu- ture Comparisons is sophomore, Keeping the runner close to first base, sophomore Johnny Comeaux of New Iberia hurls a fast ball to a University of Texas-Arlington batter. (Photo by T. Maricle) health and physical education major John Powell. (Photo by D. Smith) Baseball 169