Baseball Game Preview: Lutheran Crusaders vs. Liberty Eagles

The Lutheran Crusaders will square off against the Liberty Eagles at 4:30 p.m. on Friday. Lutheran will be strutting in after a victory while Liberty will be coming in after a defeat.

Lutheran's pitching crew heads into the game hoping to repeat the dominance they displayed on Thursday. They blew past Edinburg 11-0. Considering the Crusaders have won 11 contests by more than seven runs this season, Thursday's blowout was nothing new.

Routt Catholic hit Liberty with a four-run second inning on Thursday, which goes a long way in explaining the final result. The Eagles fell 11-8 to the Rockets.

Dylan Hocking made the most of his time in the batter's box despite the final result and went 3-for-5 with one home run, three RBI, and two runs. He has become a key player for Liberty: the team is 3-1-1 when he posts at least two runs, but 5-7 otherwise. Another player making a difference was Gavin Edgar, who went 2-for-4 with one stolen base, one double, and one RBI.

The win made it two in a row for Lutheran and bumps their season record up to 13-5. Those victories came thanks in part to their hitting performance across that stretch, as they averaged 13.0 runs over those games. As for Liberty, their loss dropped their record down to 8-8-1.