Rio Grande Saseball Opens Season in Alabama

RIO GRANDE, Ohio – The University of Rio Grande baseball team and head coach Brad Warnimont will open up the 2014 season on the road with a pair of twinbills in much warmer weather, as they travel to Spring Hill, Alabama, to face Martin Methodist on Saturday afternoon and then play host Spring Hill College in a Sunday matinée.

First pitch on Saturday is scheduled for 1 p.m. EST, while the first pich of Sunday’s doubleheader is scheduled for 2 p.m.

The RedStorm, who finished fifth in the Mid-South Conference during regular season and third in the conference’s post-season tournament last year after being picked 10th out of 11 teams in the preseason poll, must replace four starting regulars from last year’s team which finished 36-20 overall and 12-11 in the MSC.

Rio Grande was chosen eighth in this year’s conference preseason poll and looks to spread the production of graduated first team All-American outfielder Shane Spies throughout the batting order.

“This weekend’s pitching rotation is really going to depend on the weather,” Warnimont said. “I want to make sure I don’t leave all my bullets in the gun. I don’t want to end the weekend with maybe my best two arms not getting any innings.”

Projected starters for game one of Saturday’s doubleheader is junior left-handed pitcher Anthony Knittel (Portsmouth, OH), while the game two starter is likely to be senior right-handed pitcher Michael Deitsch (Cincinnati, OH).

Deitsch is coming off a season where he pitched four complete games in 13 starts for the RedStorm, while the lefty Knittel enters his first year as a member of the RedStorm after pitching for NCAA Division II Marietta College last season.

Martin Methodist comes into this season after an impressive 38-19 2013 campaign in which they were sixth in the country with a .328 team batting average and scored over seven runs per game.

Spring Hill College is coming off a 20-30 season and saw their 2013 season start off by dropping three of four at home to the RedStorm last February.

Live stats of all four games will be available at http://www.dakstats.com/Websync/Page /Webcasts.aspx?association=10.