Baseball makes first-ever appearance in NAIA Top 25, series with Jarvis moved up

For the first time in program history, the UHV baseball team is ranked by the NAIA.

On Wednesday, the NAIA announced the first NAIA Baseball GoRout Coaches' Top 25 of the regular season and UHV (20-2, 9-0) came in at No. 10. The Jaguars received votes in the preseason poll released in November, making them the biggest mover in the poll.

The Jaguars are one of two Red River Athletic Conference teams in the poll with LSU Shreveport coming in at No. 1 in Wednesday's poll.

"It's always nice to see that recognition finally happening and cracking into where we believe we should be," said head coach Jonathan Stavinoha. "It feels good and we look forward to improving on that as the season goes, and seeing how far we can take it."

This comes as UHV is set to resume conference play at Jarvis Christian (0-7, 0-6) on Thursday and Friday – the three-game series was originally scheduled for Friday and Saturday, but forecasted rain pushed the series up.

The Jaguars enter the series on an 11-game win streak, which is the third longest in program history, after beating NCAA Division I Prairie View A&M, 4-3, on the road Tuesday.

"We go into every series expecting to win every game," Stavinoha said. "But the thing is, we're playing against the game. I've said it before, it doesn't matter what team is on the other side. We're out there to play our best 27 outs, to score as many runs as possible and pitching as well as we can. We want to control what we can control. If we do that, we're gonna win a lot of baseball games."

Terry Burrel III had a two-hit, two-RBI performance to help UHV notch its second win against a D1 opponent. The Houston native ranks fifth in the RRAC in RBIs (21) and third in stolen bases (10).

Cristian Garcia continues to lead the conference in batting average, on-base percentage and slugging with a slash line of .515/.644/.803. He had a hit and a run scored against Prairie View to extend his on-base streak to 22 games.

UHV ranks second in the RRAC in average with a .335 clip at the plate. Nine Jaguars are hitting over .300 and nine have double-digit RBIs this season.

"It's not just one guy doing it," Stavinoha said. "It's all the way up and down the order. We have some guys with great individual stat lines, but it's because of a great team effort. Without the whole team, we wouldn't be where we are right now."

Mason Longoria leads the NAIA in wins after picking up his sixth of the season on Tuesday. Andrew Hurrelbrink notched his first save of the season with a perfect 1.2 innings in which the Perth, Australia, native struck out four of the five batters he faced.

UHV's probable starters of Brady Parker, Jonathan Jones and Julian Garcia have combined for a 1.52 ERA this season. The Jaguars' pitching staff boasts the sixth-best ERA in the nation with a 2.73.

Parker ranks second in the nation in strikeouts with 51 while Jones is fourth with 48. Jones' 0.75 ERA leads the RRAC with Garcia's 1.80 ranks second.

"They bring that mentality to the mound," Stavinoha said of his starters. "It's fun to watch them perform. But the bullpen has also showed itself even more as we get into these nine-inning games where you have to go to the bullpen. We can rely on them to come in and get the job done, whatever they're asked to do. It's selflessness."