ROLLA, Mo. – With an eight-game homestand now in the books, Missouri S&T's baseball team heads to the road for its next seven contests, beginning Tuesday when it heads to Springfield, Mo., to face Drury University in a 3 p.m. doubleheader at Meador Park.

S&T opened its stretch of home games with five straight victories, including a four-game sweep over Bellarmine and a come-from-behind win in the opening game of a weekend series with Truman State. However, the Bulldogs took two of the final three games in the series – the Miners won the first game of Sunday's twinbill – to leave the Miners at 12-13 overall and 7-5 in the Great Lakes Valley Conference.

On Tuesday, the Miners will have to contend with the current leader in the GLVC West, as Drury brings an 8-2 league mark and 14-7 overall record into the contest.  The Panthers have won eight consecutive games after sweeping a weekend series at home over Quincy and are 13-1 at Meador Park this season.

The Panthers have the GLVC's top offensive unit as they are hitting .336 as a team, have posted a .419 slugging percentage and have scored 133 runs in their first 21 games of the year.  Their lineup has two of the top five hitters in the league in Nick Thimesch, second in the GLVC in hitting with a .468 average and Caleb Cole, who is batting .432 on the year.

Drury's pitching staff has the league's third-best earned run average of 3.14 heading into play this week, while the Miners bring a 5.53 ERA as a team into Tuesday's twinbill.

Missouri S&T is led at the plate by second baseman Michael Lockett (O'Fallon, Mo./Timberland), who is batting .344 on the season and right fielder Trevor Karbowski (Standish, Mich./Sterling Central), who will bring a .329 batting mark into the doubleheader.  First baseman Lance Portwood (Edmond, Okla./Edmond Santa Fe), who is hitting .312, is tied with third baseman Reed Brown (Rogers, Ark./Heritage) for the team lead in runs batted in with 12.

The Miners are among four teams in the GLVC West that are tied for second behind Drury with the 7-5 conference mark as all of the GLVC squads are slated to play doubleheaders against their travel partners on Tuesday.

Following Tuesday's games, the Miners will play a four-game weekend series at Quincy on Saturday and Sunday and a non-conference game next Wednesday at Southwest Baptist before returning home to face Rockhurst on April 12.

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