Anyone know much about him?

I have to tell ya Guerry, UMASS and Southern do absolutely nothing for me. Maybe UMASS because I can see them in the American possibly one day. However, when we played Southern years ago the games were horrible.

Getting rid of Miss. st was a huge mistake.

CJ told Tammy Royce LaFrance will be back in the fall, a necessity because Tulane's defense is going to have to be really good in the fall for the Wave to rebound.

Although LaFrance was maddeningly inconsistent in 2014, he has a lot of talent. A defensive line with him and either Daren Williams or Ade Aruna as the starting ends and Tanzel Smart and Sean Wilson at DT can be very good up front, particularly if Williams or Aruna is productive.

Tulane needs a better pass rush up front than it has gotten in any of CJ's first three years, and LaFrance can bring heat on QBs. He just needs to be less moody. His effort level at times last year was subpar, but to use a cliche coaches love to use, I really do think he wants to be great. Entering his last year, he knows he has to mature and be there every quarter and every game.

Depth could be an issue. The return of Corey Redwine gives Tulane a third capable tackle, but next on the list is Calvin Thomas, who has been injured/invisible since a promising freshman season. Young ends Robert Kennedy and Quinlan Carroll have potential, but I'm not sure they will be ready this year.

Tammy reported today, with a direct quote from CJ, that Leondre James, who caught 15 passes for 169 yards as a raw true freshman but appeared capable of a breakthrough sophomore season, will not play for Tulane this fall, although CJ said he expected him back for 2016.

Tulane's offense absolutely, positively has to improve exponentially in the fall for the Wave to rebound from last year's 3-9 record, and James' absence makes an already thin position even thinner in terms of experience. Teddy Veal has to become a star. Terren Encalade has to become reliable. Devon Breaux has to give them something. And freshmen Darius Williams and Andrew Hicks, neither of whom is considered a certainty, have to be ready to play right away.

That's a lot of assumptions. If Veal gets hurt and one of the freshmen does not excel, Tulane will be below average at wideout, a massive concern as Tanner Lee looks to make significant progress from a rocky first year as a starter.

I don't think I can state it strong enough. Without better play at receiver this fall, Tulane cannot have a good year almost no matter what happens anywhere else.

The people insisting Rob Kelley would get another shot on the Tulane football team (I was not one of them) appear to be right. When I asked CJ If the door had been closed on Kelley in a phone interview tomorrow, he said "no" six or seven times in a row before adding he expected Kelley to be back for his final year of eligibility.

Kelley last played for Tulane in in 2013, rushing for 420 yards on 98 carries (4.3 average) with three touchdowns and catching 18 passes for another 176 yards.

The Green Wave is loaded at running back, but CJ believes there is room for Kelley, who remained enrolled at Tulane even though he did not play football in 2014 or this past spring.

I will cover LaFrance returning, Leondre James not returning for 2015 and the UMass/Miss St. schedule change.

It will not be a long phone conversation, but what other topics would you like addressed? I can't make any guarantees, but I will read every suggestion.

Tulane’s first recruiting class under baseball coach David Pierce took a hit on Tuesday when the St. Louis Cardinals selected Cypress Creek (Texas) High pitcher Jordan Hicks with the 105th pick of the Major League draft.

Hicks, a 6-foot-2, 185-pound right-hander, was taken higher than expected in a supplemental pick between the third and fourth rounds.

The No. 105 pick in the 2014 draft took a signing bonus of $499,500, and Hicks indicated he would sign with the Cardinals rather than going to Tulane.

“My mom used to ask me what I wanted to do when I grew up and I said I wanted to be a baseball player," Hicks told the Cypress Creek Mirror. "I just want to go out and compete against the best competition that's out there. I know I can do it. I believe in myself. I'm ready to get there already."

No draft-eligible player already on Tulane’s roster was taken Tuesday, which encompassed rounds 3 through 10. Junior closer Ian Gibaut, who went 5-3 with a 3.11 ERA and nine saves, was considered the only realistic possibility on day 2.

The other five incoming freshmen and draft-eligible transfer Chris Oakley were not taken, either.

Tulane, which reached regional play for the first time since 2008, had only three seniors –infielders Garrett Deschamp and Tyler Wilson and outfielder John Gandolfo, who was dismissed from the team before the Baton Rouge regional.

The draft will conclude with rounds 11 through 40 on Wednesday.

I wrote the Tulane preview for Athlon's but had no input on all-conference selections.

Tulane and UConn are the only two schools with no one on the first team. ECU has six, Cincinnati 5, Temple 4, Houston and USF 3, Memphis 2 and Tulsa, Navy, UCF And SMU 1 each. There are 12 players on the first-team offense (including an all-purpose guy), 11 on defense and four on special teams.

Tulane does have four defensive players on the second team--Monroe, Nickerson, Marley and LaFrance. Smart gets short-shrifted with a spot on the fourth team.

Badie and Charles Jones make the third-team offense, with Uzdavinis getting a fourth-team spot.

Preseason conference teams aren't exactly the best indicator, but this is another example of the low outside expectations for Tulane's offense, which is coming off a rough year. Three other teams do not have any players on the first- or second-team offense--SMU, Temple and UConn. Temple does not have anyone on the third team, and UConn does not have anyone on any of the four offensive teams.

I don't see any obvious omissions. Lazedrick Thompson is good enough but did not put up big numbers last year. Sean Wilson is good enough but too young. Guys like Tanner Lee and Teddy Veal will have to prove it on the field.

Now I know that from a sheer exposure standpoint the move to the AAC has been awesome compared to staying in c-usa. But has the move panned out for Tulane financially? I know as a private institution Tulane doesn't release financial data for athletics, but does anyone know how much money the AAC disbursed to its member institutions for this year? Was it more than what Tulane would have received had it stayed in c-usa? I'm not bashing the move, I think given the circumstances it was the best thing we could've done, I just would like to know how much more money is coming in.

Every year about this time people start getting excited about the computer services’ rankings of the various football teams’ recruits, especially if, like now, Tulane is rated relatively highly. Of course, this early in the recruiting year, teams with more commitments have a built in advantage, just as teams on signing day who have more signees will also have a “leg up.” Additionally, beyond all the bias involved regarding P5 vs. non-P5 schools, each service, while issuing “stars,” has totally different scoring systems.

In truth, the stars are becoming meaningless. Last year in Louisiana, ESPN rated 93 kids and gave 89 of them 3-stars or more. 247 was running about the same ratio until the last week or so before signing day when they suddenly gave 2-stars to a bunch of players who had not been rated, but had recently committed. In the end, they rated 156 players and gave 94 of them 3-stars or better. I think they were 94 of 109 a couple weeks before signing day. This year so far, 247, which seems to be the “flavor of the day” in many folks’ minds, has rated 67 Louisiana players and 60 received three stars or better. While Tulane looks good overall in the ratings from 247, a closer look shows that of the five players they list as committed to us from Louisiana (they’re missing three), only three received three stars—not quite the 90% “norm.” (small sample, of course)

The other problem with 247 is the much touted “composite” score. If you look closely, that “composite” sometimes includes only one ranking—theirs. Other times I see it includes two, three, or four, but when I check the other services, I can’t make the math work. I’m not sure what’s going on with that.

Of course, I don’t want to pick on 247. None of the services is doing a good job in my mind, though, of course, that’s all just opinion. To the best I can tell, we have ten committed players (depending on the status of Kwanzi Jackson). 247 has us with 7; Rivals has 7, ESPN has 8, and Scout has 5. Between them they have them all, but how do you rate a class if you don’t have all the commits? In Louisiana, ESPN has only rated 33 players, including only one of our commits. All 33 have received 3 stars or better. How does that tell you anything? Scout has rated 60 players and 56 have received 3 stars or better. Sadly, of the four with 2 stars, two are our guys. Rivals, which has the distinction in my mind of at least trying to differentiate (accurately or not is another issue), has rated 113 players from Louisiana and given 75 of them 3-stars or better. To highlight “grade inflation,” last year they awarded 53 players in Louisiana with 3-stars or more. This year, so far, they’re up over 40%. Every fan likes to see “their team” with a lot of “stars” in their recruiting list, and the services are “giving ‘em what they want.”

Anyway, the ratings are interesting to look at and, I think, in the aggregate give some sense of where people rate the various recruits. Once you try to rate classes, however, the built in errors and biases tend to multiply, maybe even exponentially. Whatever the services say, we need to bring in a good class, at least by AAC standards.

Roll Wave!!!

Tammy has an article discussing where Tulane players will be playing summer ball:

http://www.nola.com/tulane/index.ssf/2015/06/where_will_tulanes_baseball_pl.html#incart_river

The missing names are as interesting as the 25 who plan to play in the summer. While Chris Oakley and Matt Rowland, two JC transfers will play in the summer, Jarret DeHart, probably our most anticipated incoming hitter, will not. He is also a prime candidate for the major league draft. Oakley, of course, despite a terrible JC season, is also a likely candidate for the draft.

Off our current roster, and based on Tammy’s list, Gibaut, Carthon, Grant Brown, Hunter Lapeyre, Massey, Merrrill, and Brandon Sequeira will not participate in the summer. Gibaut and possibly Massey are also draft possibilities. Finally, J. P. France is also not playing this summer so, I’m guessing, he might not be back to 100%. The same may be true for Brown.

Here’s hoping our guys playing this summer can improve their games and that those “taking the summer off” can come back rested and ready.

Roll Wave!!!

The Monroe NewsStar broke the news that Andy Fox, Tulane's director of basketball operations this past year, has joined Louisiana Tech as an assistant.

This is not a big deal since Fox already had been replaced as a Tulane assistant after being a bench coach for the first four years of Ed Conroy's tenure. He's a good guy, though.

http://www.thenewsstar.com/story/sports/college/louisiana-tech/2015/06/05/tulanes-andy-fox-joins-techs-coaching-staff/28532879/

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Tulane got only three three-star recruits according to Rivals.com in its 2015 class, which was rated lower than the previous two under CJ. That doesn't mean it won't turn out to be a good class, though, but a lot of the guys definitely were under the radar.

With the commitment of McDonogh 35 DE Sci Martin today, Tulane has attracted a pair of 3-star recruits in the last two weeks along with St. Aug LB Giovanni LaFrance, which is a very good sign coming off a 3-9 year.

LaFrance had offers from Power Five conference schools California and Texas Tech. Martin, the No. 27 player in Louisiana according to Rivals, reportedly had offers from FSU, Miami, Utah, Arizona State, Arizona and TCU among others. About 25 years of following recruiting makes me skeptical the offers were still standing from FSU and Miami, but whatever the case, this guys was in higher recruiting circles than almost anyone CJ and his staff have signed. The only players CJ ha signed who had a higher Rivals rating were 4-star Darion Monroe, Kenneth Santa Marina and Edward Williams. Martin could be a big-time pass rusher, something Tulane has lacked for the most part in recent years.

https://rivals.yahoo.com/tulane/football/recruiting/player-Sci-Martin-160110

Martin's McDonogh 35 teammate, Jamal Crawford, committed today, too, but he is lower profile--unrated by Rivals and without any clear D1 offers at this point. Crawford is a nose guard in high school but Nola.com projects him to play center at Tulane.

The season did not end as we’d hoped, but I’m happy with the trend Couch Pierce hopefully has established this season. Last year many people opined that we had a lot of talent on the team but poor coaching was the reason for a losing season. I thought then and think now that we don’t have that much talent and superior coaching, an attitude of “never give up,” and the tenacity of certain players led to the turnaround.

Next year we should return an entire starting lineup: Williams, Willsey, Alemais, Hope, Johnson, Carthon, Kaplan, and Rogers with Grant Brown also coming back. Unfortunately, only four of those guys hit better than .260 and incoming players have a great opportunity to displace some of them and make an immediate impact. On the mound, we had seven guys throw at least 30 innings. Massey, Duester, Gibbs, Yandel, and Gibaut are all juniors. Gibaut and Massey could turn pro I suppose, but the others should be back regardless. Merrill and Rankin are sophomores and should also return. J.P. France should also be back along with Gross and Steel who each had some good moments. Add in several pitchers who didn’t throw that much. Between them Troy Ward and Sam Bjorngjeld, for example, appeared in 13 games, threw 17.2 innings, allowed nine hits (though walked eight) and only allowed one earned run. They will need a closer look next year along with the incoming guys.

I hope to learn more about those “new” guys in the next few weeks.

For now, a “well done” to the baseball team. We’re looking for better in the future.

Roll Wave!!!

The current Tulane roster on the Official Site lists 34 players including two transfers who sat out this year, Jeremy Montalbano, a catcher, and Trevor Simms, a pitcher and a kicker on the football team. As I understand it, the NCAA only allows 27 slots for scholarship players and a total of 35 players on the entire roster. Since we only have three seniors, we only have four open slots for next year prior to attrition (for whatever reason). Since Gibaut appears to be the only player who might go pro, it would appear that a number of current-roster guys will not be invited back for next year.

At this point, I have 14 players presumably committed to or signed with the Wave for next year.

PITCHERS
Chris Oakley
Jordan Hicks
Ross Massey
Peter Bovenzi

CATCHER
Garrett Gray

INFIELDERS
Cade Edwards
Jonathon Artigues
Matt Rowland
Alex Galy

OUTFIELDERS
Anthony Forte
Tyler Heinrichs
Jarret DeHart
Bobby Moskow
Luke Glancy

I can’t vouch for the currency of this list and would welcome any “new” or better information on the incoming class.

Roll Wave!!!

Holy Cross LB Kenny Hebert committed to Tulane today. He is rated two stars by Rivals.com and is the seventh commitment for the Green Wave's 2016 recruiting class.

More info to follow when I get it.

Tulane's appearance at Alex Box Stadium tonight against UNC Wilmington brings back pleasant memories for me.

This is the seventh time the Green Wave has played a regional in Baton Rouge, but the only one I attended was the first one in 1986, right after I graduated from high school in New Orleans. I had been attending Tulane games since 1980, getting into all of them free because my father was on the faculty (well, sort of), and in those days I just needed to show his card to gain admittance. From 1981 to 1986 I went to almost every home game for at least a few innings, going straight from school to the stadium during the week (single games started at 2, doubleheaders started at 1). I was at all three of Tulane's 1982 regional games at UNO--the first one when the Wave gave up back-to-back homers to Augie Schmidt and Brian Devalk leading off the ninth to lose by 2, the easy win over Jackson State the next day and the rematch with UNO when Tulane tied it in the top of the ninth but had the go-ahead run thrown out by a perfect relay at the plate, then watched as a UNO scored the winning run on a balk in the bottom of the 9th.

Four years later, in 1986, Joe Brockhoff had his best team. The pitching was not great, but the hitting was terrific, and I knew Tulane had a chance to make a deep run as LSU played host to a regional for the first time in school history. It was a six-team regional, and Tulane was seeded third behind LSU and Oklahoma, with La Tech, Eastern Kentucky and a team I don't remember rounding out the field.

My mother and I got lost in Baton Rouge on the way to the opener against La Tech (we had never been to Alex Box), and by the time we arrived, Tulane was already trailing in a game it never led, falling 7-5.

The good news was the format for second-day matchups in six-team regionals had not been set back then, and the NCAA allowed experimentation. If the format had been what it would officially become for all of the 1990s, Tulane would have had to face LSU on the second day because the loser of the 3-4 seed game played the winner of the 1-6 game. In Baton Rouge that year, though, the 3-4 loser played to 2-5 loser, the 1-6 winner played the 2-5 winner and the 3-4 winner played the 1-6 loser. Tulane faced a weak Eastern Kentucky team on day 2 while LSU had to play No. 2 Oklahoma, and Tulane crushed EKU to stay alive while LSU and La Tech both won to remain undefeated.

The third day was the best day in Tulane baseball history to that point. I can't remember whether it was the morning or the afternoon, but Tulane broke open a close game with Oklahoma with a blitzkrieg in the late innings, winning 14-5 and validating my belief it was the best Wave team ever after some scratch play to that point. LSU had beaten La Tech that day, too, and at night Tulane got a rematch with the Bulldogs and won easily (though the boxscore lists Tulane with a whopping five errors), advancing to the championship round of a regional for the first time in school history (It would not happen again until 1999). The total score on that day ws Tulane 23, opponents 9.

The LSU game turned out to be a heartbreaker. The Tigers made the CWS for the first time ever, starting their streak of dominance under Skip Bertman, but not without a huge fight from Tulane, which led 6-4 as the home team going into the final two innings but needed to beat the Tigers two straight to win the regional. LSU tied it in the eighth and went ahead in the top of the ninth before a torrential downpour delayed the finish overnight.

My sister and I drove back the next day, going through some hellacious thunderstorms on the way to Baton Rouge. Either that day or the previous day, we watched as they brought in a helicopter to drive the water off the field with its whirling blades during a delay. Tulane had runners on first and second when the game ended with LSU closer Barry Manuel on the mound. I recall the game-ending play as a weak bouncer back to the mound from pinch hitter Glen Leaveau, a lefty freshman pitcher who rarely hit, but the Tulane media guide lists it as a Tookie Spann fly out.

Tulane had a heck of a team that year, hitting .314 with an ERA of 4.15, easily the lowest in Brockhoff's final 13 years as coach. One of the afterthoughts on the pitching staff, Gene Harris, had a Major League career, but Mike Borgatti, Sam Amarena and reliever Tommy Little were the mainstays. Dan Wagner, Spann, Ron Marigny, David Smith, John Reich and Billy Rapp were some of the hitters for a team that finished 49-15 as an independent.

At the time, I thought that was the last Tulane team I would get to see play more than once or twice because I was headed to the University of Florida and did not know whether I would ever move back to New Orleans. I actually saw Tulane get eliminated from a regional at UNO by Cal Fullerton the next year (shut out by Mike Harkey in a dominant performance) on my first day back in New Orleans after my freshman year, but I've only been back to Alex Box Stadium once since then --for a regular season game with LSU three years ago.

Tonight will be the first regional game I have seen Tulane play since 1987. I can't wait.

Obviously it's an extreme long shot, but Tulane is in as good shape pitching-wise as it could be heading into Sunday.

Alex Massey will throw against the loser of LSU-UNC Wilmington (which is scoreless in the fourth) and has good enough stuff to compete with either of them.

Emerson Gibbs is ready for the second game, and although he does not appear to be a good matchup against LSU, he's been a weekend starter all year and should be up for the challenge.

The Wave can go piecemeal if it survives to Monday. Ian Gibaut has not pitched yet and should be good to give two innings tomorrow and Monday out of the bullpen. Pierce said he had not ruled out bringing back Corey Merrill or Patrick Duester on short rest, either. That trio could give the way nine innings if necessary.

Today could not have gone any better, with Merrill not being overtaxed because of the rain delay that forced him to stop after five innings and Tim Yandel pitching the last four innings to save the rest of the bullpen.

A really bad game against UNCW from almost every aspect. But, the good thing about baseball is that it is only one game and, just like being down with 2 out in the ninth, we still have a chance. Go on a six game winning streak and we go to Omaha.
Be that as it may, we need to win today first. Losing the last four of the year would be a bad way to finish a "comeback" season. Win this one and we can focus on the next one.

Roll Wave!!!

The entire Tulane baseball team went to a local restaurant on Magazine Street for David Pierce's radio show on Wednesday before heading to Baton Rouge.

I did not make it Alex Box Stadium for post-practice interviews today but will be there to cover every game Tulane plays in the Baton Rouge Regional.

Here are some quotes from Wednesday:

GARRETT DESCHAMP

How excited are you

"It’s definitely exciting, a postseason berth. It’s a chance to get to Omaha, and to get that chance is awesome. We’re ready to get to Baton Rouge tomorrow and start practicing and visualizing the game on Friday night."


On UNC Wilmington's shaky starting pitching:

"We don’t know who’s pitching. All we know is they have a couple of guys who throw hard. They don’t have the best numbers, but they do have great stuff and they swing the hell out of the bat. I feel confident in our pitchers and especially our defense. The way we’re swinging the bat, if we can hold them to one or two runs, we definitely are going to have a chance to come out of their on top."


On his personal host streak:

"Unfortunately I didn’t swing the bat as well, but I did take pride in my defense. I knew I wasn’t swinging the bat so I took extra pride in the defense. I’m just happy that I can contribute what people predicted for me and what coach expected me to do offensively."

On playing the regional in his hometown:

:It’s definitely a kind of a homecoming. I have friends texting me for tickets, so it’s definitely going to be exciting having a whole bunch of people I went to high school with in the stands."

What need to do to win first game

"Just limit our mistakes and go out there and play relaxed and be the most physical and just grind the hardest—grind for outs and hit the ball."

On adjusting to second base:

"I feel comfortable whether it’s first or second. I’ve been practicing this week hard, getting the range down and stuff like that. I have to run a little bit farther, but I think I’m going to be fine."

RICHARD CARTHON

Turning point

"The turning point was somewhere between ECU and Houston. We went to ECU and lost the first two and won the next one, and then to come back and have it again against Houston, coach got into us. We decided we weren’t going to let this happen to us. We were going to make a difference. The next day we beat Houston and then we started winning after that."

On David Pierce challenging team a few times during year:

"If you’re performing under par, he’ll tell you to your face. He just really challenges you to really get over yourself and if you are struggling he’ll challenge you to do better because he knows you’re capable of doing better."

On his personal hot streak:

"It just comes down to believing in yourself and also just doing it for the guys in there. Coach said stats don’t really matter right now, it’s just helping the team win. I bought into helping the team win."

On team hitting better:

"It’s great to be hot towards the end of the season. If a team’s been hot all year and then gets cold in the playoffs, it doesn’t really serve them much justice. I’d rather be getting hot right now. I hope we stay hot."

On Alex Box

"It’s one of the greatest experiences you can ask for. There’s nothing like thousands of fans going out there, cheering you on or even picking at you, too. It’s fun. It’s going to be great. We’re going to have a good amount of Tulane fans, but we also know there’s going to be LSU fans out there not wanting us to win. We’re looking very forward to all the fans that are coming out there."

DAVID PIERCE

On pitchign rotation:

"I feel like we have four solid starters. I don’t think we have one that separates himself from the others. It gives us a lot of flexibility."

On numbers saying not good hitting team, but hot right now

"There’s no doubt. I think we’re swinging the bats as well as we’ve swung it all year, and we’re swinging it with confidence. I’d like to see us execute a little bit better in some of our hit and runs and slash plays. Maybe it will all come together in one weekend."

On Deschamp:

"When you are a senior, you have some expectations from your teammates, and when you struggle early, it’s hard to deal with. He’s handled it really well. He’s gotten to the point as of late that the numbers really don’t matter. The only thing that matters is what we’re doing right now. You can see that. He’s much more comfortable and he’s not worried about his numbers."

On what makes Gibaut most effective:

"For him to be at his best he has to really utilize his slider. Everybody is cheating to his fast ball, and it’s a lot tougher to hit when he’s got that second pitch."

On Gibaut in good place:

"He threw really well in his bullpen this week. If you look back at the (last UConn game in the AAC tourney) and study how the game unfolded, he gave up an innocent hit to left, a ball that took a bad hop and the next thing you know he strikes out the leadoff guy. We could have had two outs and a runner on and the whole inning changes. I think he got a little exhausted, and when he did, he really started trying to throw harder and do too much as opposed to taking a step back, catching his back and really pitching."

On Gibaut needing to be heavier or lighter:

"Heavier is an excuse. He should definitely work on being leaner. It’s an out for whoever says it. A healthier body is definitely where he needs to be."

IAN GIBAUT

On getting chance to wipe away memory of UConn loss:

"We obviously didn’t want to go in the tournament and go 1-2, but the big picture is we made a regional, so that’s all that matters. I felt good out there. I didn’t feel too tired. A few unlucky things happened. It was just baseball."

On wanting to get back out on mound:

"I feel great right now. I’m ready to get back out there against UNC Wilmington and against the winner of LSU-Lehigh. We’d all be excited to play LSU in the regionals. That’s what we want to do, so it’s going to be fun in their hometown."

On atmosphere at Alex Box:

"It’s going to be awesome. There’s going to be 10,000 plus and we are going to have that adrenaline pumping. It’s going to be an awesome atmosphere for everyone."

On UNC Wilmington hitting

"We are always going to pitch to our pitching strengths, whoever’s out there. After that you’re going to go to the hitter’s weakness, but every batter you are going to pitch to your strengths and then after that you are going to attack the hitter’s weakness. They were a good hitting team on March 31st and they still are, and we were able to handle them pretty good, so I think we’ll be all right."

Not surprisingly, LSU gets most of the ink, but each team gets a preview at the bottom.

http://www.d1baseball.com/analysis/2015-baton-rouge-regional-preview/

Here are my thoughts after spending the week looking at Tulane and researching UNC Wilmington:

1) UNC Wilmington is no joke at the plate.

At first, I discounted the Seahawks offensive numbers as the product of playing in the Colonial Athletic Association, the 13th-rated conference with no teams inside the top 135 of the RPI other than No. 2 seeds Charleston and UNC Wilmington. But when I looked at their results, I noticed this team averaged exactly six runs in the 16 games it played against regional team, with all of those games legitimate except for two against Columbia. In contrast, Tulane scored 67 runs in 19 games against tourney teams (3.5 average).

UNCW scored 14 runs while getting swept in a three-game series at FSU, losing by a combined four runs.

UNCW scored 28 runs while winning two of three from Maryland, an at-large team that held 32 of its last 47 opponents to four or fewer runs.

UNCW scored at least four runs in its five late-season meetings with Charleston, which many observers thought deserved a No. 1 seed and should have played host to a regional rather than UCSB.

The Seahawks' starting pitching has been woeful, but Tulane's Patrick Duester needs to be sharp tomorrow night or he could have a long evening. Average stuff won't get it done against these guys.

2) David Pierce's decision to start Duester was not a big surprise.

For that matter, with Tulane having four starters who are pretty similar in their performance, he had a lot of different options with none of them being clearly wrong. Here's an article from Tammy at Nola.com on Pierce's thought process with a quote from Duester as well.

http://www.nola.com/tulane/index.ss...pierce_says.html#incart_2box_tulane_index.ssf

Duester was Tulane's best starter in Clearwater, going seven innings and allowing one run while beating UConn. Although he had control issues, they weren't as severe as Alex Massey's or Corey Merrill's. He threw a career-high eight strikeouts in Tulane's win at UNCW on March 31, allowing eight hits in 5.2 innings (three runs). And, just as significantly, he never was an option to pitch against LSU if the Wave wins after getting beaten twice by the Tigers in the regular season, giving up five runs in 3.1 innings the first time before faring better at Alex Box Stadium. LSU already has seen him, and Tulane needs to use a guy the Tigers have not faced. It will be either Merrill or Massey, who went one inning in relief in the first meeting. Merrill, who pitched two scoreless innings as the starter in Tulane's 4-3, 11-inning victory against LSU at Turchin last year, would be the likely choice.

3) Tulane needs to do its damage in the first six innings.

The Wave had six runs by the end of the sixth in Wilmington earlier this year on the way to its 8-4 win and could use similar success this time. Seahawks starter Ryan Foster (6-1, 4.42 ERA) has been hit hard in his last six outings, giving up 47 hits and 28 runs in 32.1 innings (wow, that's bad). Tulane struggled against an ECU pitcher with similarly bad numbers (though not bad) in the AAC tournament and cannot afford another mediocre outing against a guy struggling this much. The Wave has hit better than .300 as a team in the last five games, getting consistent production from Garrett Deschamp, Richard Carthon, Hunter Williams and Tyler Wilson. Stephen Alemais has been good all year, so this is not the same anemic lineup that struggled to score for much of the year.

4) The revamped infield needs to sparkle.

Because Jake Willsey has three games left on his suspension, Tulane will stick with the three-player shift it used in his absence in the final game at the AAC tournament, with Deschamp moving from first to second, Tyler Wilson moving to first from third and Hunter Hope reclaiming his starting spot at third. For a full story on the infield, here's Scott Kushner's piece in The Advocate:

http://www.theneworleansadvocate.com/sports/tulane/12488792-123/green-wave-adapts-to-second

Hope is good at third base. The question is whether Deschamp, who was playing quite well at first, can come close to duplicating Willsey's smoothness and chemistry with Alemais, one of Tulane's best strengths during the year. Against a good offensive team like UNCW, Tulane cannot afford to make mistakes that give the Seahawks extra chances or fail to take advantage of double-play opportunities.

5) Play relaxed

Pierce stressed this factor the day Tulane received its regional bid. After playing under intense pressure in the final month to get into the tournament, it is time to enjoy the experience and loosen up. This is a game Tulane should win even thought it is the lower seed, but UNC Wilmington, which has been to regionals in three of the last four years, enters with much more experience than the Wave. The players absolutely, positively would love a shot at LSU on Saturday, but they can't let that motivation become a distraction. If they go out, have fun and swing the bats like they have in the last two weeks, they should be fine.

Here's the story from sports info.

http://www.tulanegreenwave.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/052815aaa.html

For what it's worth, I've heard Jarreau is damaged goods at this point and will never be back to full health. If Tulane is getting the supremely active shot blocker who was a force against Oklahoma and the Wave in back-to-back games last December, this is a huge pickup.

But he tailed off after that and needs to make some significant improvement health-wise to get back to that level.

Double post.