Tuesday Tidbits
I made it out of Brookings:
SDSU’s wrestling over Southern Illinois Edwardsville on Saturday in the home dual debut of coach Chris Bono was the Jacks’ first home dual win over an NCAA Division I program since Feb. 15, 2008. That was a 31-15 win over Portland State, a school that has since dropped its program.
Jacks sophomore Zach Zenner has retained the Football Championship Subdivision rushing lead for another week. Wofford senior Eric Breitenstein ran for 135 in a loss to North Dakota State, pushing his final total to 2,035. Zenner is at 2,044.
Only one of the top 10 rushers is still alive in the postseason - Georgia Southern’s Jerick McKinnon. He has 1,649 heading into a semifinal game in Fargo.
The SDSU baseball schedule was released Monday and it features just four games against major-power teams. That’s the lowest since the Jacks moved to the D-I in 2004. They’ve scheduled as many as 12 and as few as five in previous years. (Only four were played in 2010, but five were scheduled - one was lost due to weather.)
Factor in the departure of powerhouse Oral Roberts from the Summit League, and SDSU is facing a very different slate in the second year under Dave Schrage.
However, Schrage said that wasn’t necessarily by design. Some 60 percent of the schedule was in place before he took over. He added events in Port Charlotte and Terre Haute and got the Jacks into the Metrodome for a 24-hour event. And he had to cancel six games - including affairs with Iowa and Nebraska - because the Summit League schedule was increased to 30 games.
Accordingly, the 2014 and 2015 slates are well underway. SDSU already has deals to face teams from the Big East, Conference USA and the Mountain West, according to Schrage.
Terry Vandrovec also posts regular updates on his Twitter page.
