March 13, 2012

Recap | Box Score | Photo Gallery

Head Coach Ray Tanner
Opening statement…
“I was really impressed with the outing Westmoreland gave us. He looked good in his previous appearance and we went with him tonight and it was encouraging for me. I thought his stuff was good. He had some command and got us in a position that we could win. He gave us a quality start and then the bullpen did a good job holding those guys off. We swung the bats pretty well. Five runs is not a lot, but its more than we’ve been scoring so that’s somewhat encouraging so hopefully we can continue to swing the bats and get close to double digits and try to get a few more runs. It was a good game for us, it was well played.”

On Adam Westmoreland’s performance…
“I think its kind of too early to tell he’s one of those guys that if he didn’t pitch on the weekend he is certainly going to be a candidate for the middle of the week, but he’s an older guy now, he can pitch in the league so if you can have him available you have to think about that too. We sort of take it one day at a time just like you look at our box score, we have six guys that got in the game today. Inning by inning, batter by batter we try to win the game and that’s the way we approach it. He looks good to me and he should get plenty of opportunities going forward.”

On the middle infield…
“I don’t want to get too excited right now, but they have been solid. They have been steady. They played with some energy. They have been very consistent and they are more comfortable now than they were a few games ago and they can make the routine play. The way we’ve been pitching it, that should be okay. If you get a little bit of offense, that’s good as well. I think they’ve done a really good job for us.”

On Erik Payne’s performance…
“It still is a small sample but he’s done pretty well with what he’s had to work with so I’m not going to go back tonight and say that Payne is not playing tomorrow, he’s in there tomorrow. We’ll take it day to day and see how it goes, but he has solidified himself for now. He’s not a guy that’s been here for three years and has a career batting average of .300 and has played a lot. He’s played very little but for what he’s done he deserves to be in there and I’m going to stick with him right now.”

Sophomore Infielder, Erik Payne
On how comfortable he is at middle infield…
“Day by day I’m getting more comfortable. Connor and I play well with each other and we are just trying to take it day by day.”

On getting tagged out at home to stop an In-the-Park Homerun…
“I hit a couple triples in the spring and Coach Holbrook made comments on how slow I was when I got to third base so I really wasn’t expecting for him to wave me, but I didn’t really slow down. The guys made a really good relay and they got me.”

Freshman Outfielder, Tanner English
On dropping down in the batting order…
“Typically nine hole guys get a lot of fast balls. Coach Tanner moved me down there to get what I did last weekend out of my head. I had to go down there and get comfortable and swing the bat. I got a few good pitches and put them into play.”

Junior Left-handed Pitcher, Adam Westmoreland
On first extended action…
“I was really excited to get back out there. I’m always excited for the opportunity to pitch. As far as change from last year I feel a lot better physically and mentally as far as anything else. Going out there and trying to get ahead of hitters was the big thing I was trying to do. I wasn’t so much worried about being extended because as a starter that’s what you try to do anyways, you try to go as long as you can.”

On new middle infield…
“I like it. I think that Erik Payne and Connor Bright work really well together and so far it’s worked out. I think that’s what we are staying with for right now. But the younger guys are going to try to get some innings and try to get some stuff squared away and figure out who plays where. Those two in the middle right now are gelling very well together.”