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Sports

Cougars hoping to break Green Wave

Tulane will be UH's third straight top 25 opponent

by LOUIE VERA
The Daily Cougar

The UH baseball team will try to snap a three-game skid when it takes on Baseball America No. 23 Tulane in a three-game weekend series at Zephyr Field in New Orleans. The opener is set to start at noon Friday. 

Houston (19-17, 6-3 Conference USA) will start junior right-hander Aaron Brown, who has won three of his last five starts.

Brown (5-2, 4.37 ERA) understands that his performance will be crucial to the team's success this weekend.

"Friday nights (are) big for us," Brown said. "If I can't go out there and give us seven or eight good innings, that would put us at a big disadvantage on the weekends since we have so few guys on the pitching staff." 

The three-game drought that included losses to No. 7 Rice and No. 16 Texas A&M saw the UH pitching staff give up a combined 31 runs.

Head coach Rayner Noble said his hurlers must take control when they toe the rubber for the team to have a fighting chance.

"We need to come alive on the mound," Noble said. "We're going to need our starting pitchers to do (their) jobs. If they'll do that, that'll give us an opportunity to fare well."

Tulane (28-11, 8-3 C-USA) heads into this weekend with victories in five of its last six games. 

Tulane will be UH's third consecutive top 25 opponent, and the Cougars aren't anticipating a day at the beach.

"Tulane's going to be another tough battle, just like it was against Rice," senior infielder Josh Stirneman said. "We play well against Rice for the most part, and we have to make sure we do the same against Tulane. If we play hard, we can win (the series)."

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