SIOUX FALLS, S.D.- The Augustana baseball team continues the 2024 season with a Tuesday game in St. Joseph, Missouri against Missouri Western. First pitch is slated for 3 p.m.

Complete action can be followed on GoAugie.com/Live and the GoAugie app, presented by The Original Pancake House. The app can be downloaded in the App Store or Google Play. 

Series History
This will be the first matchup between the two teams since 2008 and 23rd all-time matchup. The teams split a pair of games in the 2008 doubleheader, with the last game ending in a 10-2 Viking victory. 

The Griffons
Missouri Western is 9-4 overall to open the season after beating Northeastern State 2 out of 3 last weekend. MWSU scored 43 runs in the three games while allowing 39. They're led by first-year head coach Damian Stambersky. 

Jackson Bryant is hitting .444 (20 for 45) in 12 games and leads the team with 18 RBI. Five qualifying hitters have reached base over 40 percent of the time, led by the .510 on base percentage of Kaden Doan. Ryan Kobal is batting .412 (21 of 51) with a team-high five doubles and 1.121 OPS. 

The Vikings
Augustana is 2-2 overall after splitting at Regis last weekend. The Vikings scored 36 runs on the weekend, including 26 combined in their two wins. 

The Vikings opened the season with an impressive 13-2 victory on Friday afternoon. The Vikings scattered 20 hits between 11 batters, including hits from all nine starters. Drey Dirksen picked up where he left off a season ago, going 3 for 5 with a double, home run, and three RBI while scoring all three times he reached base. Ragan Pinnow also recorded three hits, including a pair of doubles. Caleb Saari threw five shutout innings in his season-opening victory, striking out a pair. 

Max Mosser is batting .500 (5 for 10) on the year through four games to lead the team in batting. Dirksen slugged a pair of home runs while batting .333 (4 for 12) and tallied a 1.473 OPS. The Vikings were a perfect 9 for 9 in stolen bases, led by a pair of steals from Trevor Winterstein. 

Nine AU hitters have recorded multi-hit games, led by three from Jack Hines. Hines and Winterstein were also the only hitters to record hits in all four games. Hines is hitting .412 (7 for 17) thus far with a home run and four RBI.

Saari and J.D. Hennen each opened their seasons with scoreless starts. Hennen went four innings while striking out five and allowing an opponents batting average of .071 on Saturday. Ashton Michek also earned a start on Saturday, allowing just two earned runs in six innings and recorded four strikeouts. 

Out of the bullpen, Tom Sun, Kai Taylor, Aidan Torpey, Drew Ball, and Maddox Foss combined for 8 ⅔ scoreless innings and nine strikeouts. Taylor recorded three strikeouts in two innings while allowing just one baserunner to lead the group. 

One Last Thing
Drey Dirksen hit a pair of home runs on the weekend to give him 38 in his career, fifth most in program history. He now sits two away from fourth and 11 away from the program record, held by Nate Baumann (49, 2008-11). Trevor Winterstein is now ninth in program history with 44 stolen bases. Caleb Saari also broke a tie for eighth in career strikeouts with 180.