Arkansas City, KS – Indian Hills Baseball returns to action this weekend with a four-game series against No. 17 nationally ranked Cowley College (KS).

DETAILS: Indian Hills at No. 17 Cowley

Saturday, February 4 – Monday, February 6

Arkansas City, KS  |  Cowley Baseball Facility

WATCH LIVE: Cowley Sports Network

LIVE STATS: Indian Hills vs. Cowley

LEADING OFF

The Warriors are coming off a 3-1 weekend at the Babe Howard JUCO Classic, including a 3-1 victory over then-No. 8 Wabash Valley College (IL). Indian Hills is 5-3 overall on the year and will be making its first appearance on the mound outside the state of Tennessee this season.

Cowley, who began the year at No. 7 in the preseason NJCAA poll is ranked No. 18 in this week's ranking after opening up the year 2-4. The Tigers went 2-1 against Grayson College (TX) before falling to No. 3 McLennan Community College (TX) in three straight games.

DIAMOND NOTES

• The Warriors swept the weekly ICCAC Athlete of the Week awards after sophomores Daniel Figueroa was named ICCAC Player of the Week and Jack Nelson was honored as the ICCAC Pitcher of the Week.
• Through eight games, Indian Hills has outscored its opponents 46-37 this year. In the team's five wins, Indian Hills has outscored its opponents 34-11.
• The Indian Hills bullpen has seen strong performances from a trio of arms – Andrei Gordeev, Sam Hart, and Nathan Smithburg who have not allowed a run in 14.0 innings of work with two wins and two saves.
• Originally scheduled for a Friday start, the weekend series has been pushed back to Saturday.

CHASING FIGUEROA

Sophomore Daniel Figueroa is on the verge of history entering Saturday's series. The returning NJCAA All-Region XI  First-Team selection from a year ago stole six bases in four games last weekend to push his career total to 49.

Figueroa's 49 career stolen bases are currently third-most in school history dating back to the 1994 season and are just four shy of setting the new school record, currently held by Julio Campos (1997-98).

Figueroa, who is batting a team-high .519 on the year so far, posted the second-most steals in a single season last year with 43.

LAST TIME OUT

The Warriors opened up last year's campaign with a four-game series against Cowley, ranked No. 6 in the nation at the time. The Warriors earned a split with the Tigers, winning the bookends with an 8-7 opener and a 14-9 finale.

During the series, Figueroa went 8-15 at the plate with five runs scored, including two extra base hits and five stolen bases.

SERIES HISTORY

The two storied NJCAA programs will meet in back-to-back years for the first time since the 1997 and 1998 seasons when both clubs squared off in the JUCO World Series in each season.

Indian Hills defeated Cowley 11-6 in the second round in 1997 before falling to the Tigers in the elimination game 15-9. The Tigers went on to the win the World Series that year.

In 1998, Indian Hills defeated Cowley 17-7 to advance to the elimination finals, but eventually fell to San Jacinto to place third overall. Cowley went on to win its second consecutive title.

SCOUTING THE TIGERS

Cowley enters the weekend after a competitive schedule to open up the year, facing two perennial JUCO World Series contenders.

• Cowley outscored 24-22 in the three-game series win after collecting 24 total hits.
• In the three games against No. 3 McLennan, Cowley scored just three runs, but allowed only 10 runs.
• Jadyn McNealy leads the way with a .350 batting average while Ty Hammack is batting .318.
• 14 different Tigers have seen the mound and have totaled 64 strikeouts in 46 innings of work.

TORRES' NOTES

"This weekend will be a really good test for our club," stated head coach Matthew Torrez. "We have played a decent schedule up to this point, but it's a little different when you have to play the same team four times in a weekend.

We will need to go out and execute our game plan, along with our kids really wanting to be in the moment. We did a really good job staying in the moment and accepting competition against Wabash, now we need to do that for four games this weekend."

WHAT'S NEXT

Following the four-game set with Cowley, the Warriors will make their home debut at historic Pat Daugherty Field on Friday, March 10. Indian Hills will host Ellsworth Community College for a doubleheader at 1:00 PM before hosting Southwestern Community College for two games on Sunday.

Southwestern and Ellsworth will also play a doubleheader at Pat Daugherty Field on Saturday afternoon.