Cowboy baseball returns home to host Colorado School of Mines starting Thursday

LAS VEGAS, N.M. --- The New Mexico Highlands baseball team has a chance to pull into playoff positioning with only two RMAC series left as the Cowboys host Colorado School of Mines in a four-game series starting 3 p.m. Thursday at Brandt Baseball Field.

NMHU sits in seventh place in the RMAC standings at 8-12, a game back of Colorado School of Mines at 7-9 and two games back of Colorado Christian (8-8). The top six teams in the RMAC make the postseason tournament.

The two teams played a pair of non-conference games in Golden earlier in the month with the Cowboys winning one game 11-10 and CSM winning the other 15-2.

THE COWBOYS HEADING INTO THE SERIES | 2022 STATISTICS
NMHU got a much-needed series win at CSU Pueblo last weekend, winning the first three games of the series 12-6, 10-8 and 7-2 before dropping the series finale 9-7.

The Cowboys at the plate are 25th in the nation and third in the RMAC in home runs with 49. Leading the way is Jared Brown who has 11 homers - tied for fifth in the RMAC - to go along with 44 RBI - third in the RMAC. Joe Kuhn has 10 homers, 10th in the RMAC, while Brandon Baier has eight home runs (13th in the RMAC) 39 RBI (eighth in the RMAC). Estevan De La O is hitting a team-best .372 (along with Baier), leads the RMAC with 58 hits and leads NCAA Division II with eight triples on the season.

Dominick Castillo leads NMHU in ERA this season at 5.56 in 14 appearances (two starts, 22.2 innings) and has 17 strikeouts. Hunter Waugh leads NMHU starters in ERA at 6.98 with32 strikeouts  in 49 innings.

COLORADO SCHOOL OF MINES HEADING INTO THE SERIES | 2022 STATISTICS
The Orediggers were off last weekend - last playing April 5 in an 11-8 win over Division-I Northern Colorado as CSM hasn't played an RMAC contest since March 27.

Luke Folsom leads the team in hitting at .393 with a 1.111 OPS thanks to five homers and 15 doubles on the season. Toby Scoles is hitting .351 with three homers and seven doubles while Adam Houghtaling is hitting .333 with six homers and five doubles in just 60 at-bats.

Tyler Blomster has been dominant this season in 50 innings of work, giving up just five earned runs (0.90 ERA) with 50 strikeouts and seven walks. CSM has three relievers with an ERA under 4.00 after thant with the next starter with an ERA under 5.00 is Kevin Zapanta at 4.81 with 47 strikeouts in 43 innings of work.