TCU Baseball Opens Home Slate Friday vs. Cal-State Fullerton

The No. 20 TCU Horned Frogs will open the 2013 home schedule Friday night when they welcome No. 19 Cal State Fullerton. First pitch is set for 6:30 p.m. at Lupton Stadium.

FOLLOW THE FROGS
All season long fans will have the ability to follow the Frogs through an audio and video stream. TCU will have a web stream for all home games as well as an audio stream for all road games. For a monthly subscription of $9.95 or a yearly subscription of $79.95, fans can have access to all multi-media platforms. To purchase, click here.

TCU NOTABLES
• TCU was swept for the first time since the 2008 season when it dropped a three-game series at Wichita State.
• It was just the third sweep in the Jim Schlossnagle era. The first came in 2004 at Southern Miss.
• Eleven players made their debut this weekend. Eight played in the field and three debuted on the mound.
• Jantzen Witte hit the first home run of the season for the Horned Frogs. It was the 12th of his career.
• Preston Morrison fanned a career-high nine batters against the Rebels on Saturday.
• Derek Odell drove in three of the Frogs' four runs this past weekend.
• Ten of the 11 runs the Horned Frogs allowed this past weekend came with two outs.
• TCU committed just three errors on the weekend.
• Five of the Frogs' 18 hits on the weekend went for extra bases.

CAL STATE FULLERTON NOTABLES
• After a 4-0 start the first weekend of the season, the Titans are ranked in all of the polls. They come in as high as 19 (NCBWA/Collegiate Baseball).
• Cal State Fullerton upended Pepperdine 6-3 Wednesday afternoon to improve to 5-0.
• Chad Wallach has gotten off to a fast start, hitting .438 through the first five games. J.D. Davis leads the team with 12 RBIS and two home runs.
• The Titans have flashed tons of speed on the bases, stealing 10 bases in 11 attempts. They are led by Carlos Lopez's four stolen bases.
• On the mound, CSF has a miniscule 2.00 ERA with one shutout.
• Michael Lorenzen has already notched a pair of saves and has retired all six batters he's faced this year.
• Defensively, the Titans are fielding .978 with four errors.

SERIES NOTABLES
• TCU and Cal State Fullerton are meeting for the 20th time in program history.
• The Titans hold a 12-7 lead in the all-time series.
• 2013 marks the sixth straight season that the two programs have met on the diamond.
• Since the series began in 2009, the Titans hold a slim 8-7 lead.
• This season will be the Titans third trip to Lupton Stadium. Cal State Fullerton has won the previous two series played in Fort Worth.
• TCU is just 2-4 against the Titans in Fort Worth.

LUPTON STADIUM NOTABLES
• The 2013 season marks the 11th season at Lupton Stadium.
• The Horned Frogs have an all-time record of 234-78 record at home.
• The Frogs are 6-4 in home openers at Lupton Stadium.
• In each of the last two seasons, the Horned Frogs have ranked in the top 12 nationally in attendance.
• Both years, TCU was No. 1 in attendance among private schools.
• TCU has averaged over 4,000 fans per game each of the last two seasons.

A RARE OCCURRENCE
For just the third time in Jim Schlossnagle's tenure at TCU, the Horned Frogs failed to win a game in a regular season series. It's the first time since the 2008 campaign that the Frogs were swept in a three-game series when Wichita State won all three March 14-16.

The only other school to sweep a series from TCU in Schlossnagle's tenure was Southern Miss in Hattiesburg April 2-4, 2004.

TCU has had tons of success in weekend series under the guidance of Coach Schlossnagle. The Frogs are 94-20-1 all-time in series since Schlossnagle took over the program in 2004. Included in that total are 52 series sweeps.

DUCKS ON THE POND
The Horned Frogs left 25 men on base in the three-game series at Ole Miss. That's an average of over eight runners left on per game. Conversely, the Rebels left just 17 runners on for an average of just under six per game.

Over half (13) of the base runners left on by Horned Frogs were in scoring position. On the flip side, Ole Miss left nine runners in scoring position.

PASSING THROUGH THE TURNSTILES
Over the past three seasons, the popularity of TCU baseball has reached all new heights. For the second straight season, the Frogs averaged over 4,100 fans per game. Since the start of the 2010 season, the Frogs are averaging 3,831 fans per game.

The Frogs ranked 11th nationally in average attendance in 2012 at 4,112 per game. Additionally, 131,610 fans passed through the turnstiles, a mark that also ranked 11th nationally. Both marks were tops among private schools. While both were tops in the Mountain West, they would have ranked second in the Big 12 as it is made up today.

In 2012, the Frogs saw four of the top 10 crowds and all 10 have come the last two seasons.

HOME SWEET HOME
The Frogs have enjoyed the home cooking of Lupton Stadium since it opened in 2003. TCU has an all-time record of 234-78 (.750) at Lupton Stadium, tallying at least 20 wins in nine of 10 seasons.

In 2012, the Frogs boasted a 23-9 record in 32 home games. As a team, TCU outscored its opponents 148-90. The Frogs tallied 42 doubles, eight triples and 10 home runs at home in 2012.

On the mound, the pitching staff enjoyed the friendly confines to the tune of a 2.45 ERA with five shutouts. The staff fanned 243 batters and held opponents to a .227 batting average against.

IN A PINCH
A bright spot at the plate this past weekend for the Horned Frogs was the contributions from the bench players. The Frogs pinch hit seven times over the weekend and collected three hits for a .429 average.

Boomer White, Travis Hennessey and Kevin Daniels all tallied their first career hits as pinch hitters.

In total, the Frogs substitutions are hitting .400 (4-for-10) on the season. Hennessey leads the way with two hits in three at-bats off the bench.

REACHING A MILESTONE
Jantzen Witte had 196 hits coming into this past weekend's series at Ole Miss. He hit a very impressive milestone in Sunday's contest when he collected the 200th hit of his career.

Of his 200 career hits, 48 have been doubles, two are triples and 12 home runs. He has the most success at the plate against New Mexico, collecting 27 career hits against Lobo pitching.

Over the course of his career, he has tallied 58 multi-hit games. He has hit safely in 121 of his 157 career games.

NEW FACES GALORE
The Frogs welcomed 17 new faces to the team this past fall. This past weekend 10 of them saw action in at least one contest.

At the plate, four newcomers made at least one start and four more saw playing time. Kyle Bacak and Cody Jones started all three games, while Dylan Fitzgerald made two starts. Kevin Daniels started one game. Also debuting were Travis Hennessey, Boomer White, Paul Hendrix and Paddy O'Brien.

On the mound, three new faces toed the rubber, all in a relief stint. Alex Young made his first collegiate appearance on Friday night, while Riley Ferrell made his collegiate debut on Sunday. Transfer Trevor Seidenberger also made his TCU debut on Sunday.

SAME PLACE, NEW LOOK
Since the final game of the 2012 season was played at Lupton Stadium on May 20, lots of changes have been made.

This past offseason, Lupton underwent some various facelifts. The biggest change comes on the field of play. The outfield fence was moved in and new padding was installed. The new dimensions of Lupton are: 330 down the left field line, 375 to left center, 395 to center, 370 to right center and 325 down the right field line.

Additionally, a terraced berm and party patio was added to the area along the right field line. The berm will make for better viewing of the game and provide more seating for increased capacity.