GEORGIA STATE (8-26, 4-5) vs. TROY (15-16, 3-6)
April 16-18  |  GSU Baseball Complex

THE SERIES
Friday, 6 p.m. 
Saturday, 3 p.m. 
Sunday, 2 p.m.

PROBABLE PITCHERS
Friday: Fr. LHP Cameron Jones  (0-4, 5.19) - Career-high 7 strikeouts vs. Georgia Southern
Saturday: Jr. RHP Trey Horton (0-1, 3.38) - Leads team with 14 app.
Sunday: So. RHP Ryan Watson (2-4, 7.08) - 10 career victories

LEADING OFF

> Georgia State returns home to host Sun Belt Conference East Division rival Troy in a weekend series at the GSU Baseball Complex. The Panthers stand one game ahead of Troy in the East Division standings.

> Fifteen of Georgia State's first 34 games have been against nationally-ranked foes, and 19 have been against teams from Power 5 Conferences.

> Georgia State's last Sun Belt game featured an improbable comeback. Trailing App State 12-6 on Sunday, the Panthers scored nine runs in the ninth inning, capped by Josh Smith's go-ahead grand slam, and won 15-13. Ryan Glass started the scoring with an RBI-single, and then Cameron Jones' three-run homer, the first of his career, made it 12-10.  After Dalton Pearson's RBI-single brought GSU within one, the Panthers were down to their last strike when Griffin Cheney was hit by a pitch to load the bases. Then Smith hit the 1-2 pitch over the center field fence.

> One game later at No. 20 Georgia, the Panthers almost pulled off another dramatic comeback. GSU scored five runs in the ninth, including RBI-singles by Dalton Pearson and Will Mize and a three-run homer by Will Goldberg, but the rally came up just short in the 10-7 loss.

> Josh Smith is the reigning Sun Belt Conference Player of the Week. His game-winning grand slam at App State capped a week in which he hit .438 (7-for16) with seven RBI and six runs scored. The sophomore outfielder is the Panthers' leading hitter at .304, along with a team-leading 16 walks for a .410 on-base pct.

> Junior first baseman Ryan Glass also had a big day against App State as he homered twice, including a grand slam, in Sunday's first game. He drove in seven runs in the doubleheader, including an RBI-single for the first run of the ninth-inning rally in Game 2. 

> Second baseman Griffin Cheney has started Georgia State's last 104 games at 2B, SS or 3B. In those 103 games, he has failed to reach base only 11 times. Cheney had three hits and an RBI last game at Georgia and is 6-for-15 over the last three games.

> Friday starter Cameron Jones is a two-way player who also sees time at first base and is hitting .348 in limited action. He hit a three-run homer in Sunday's nine-run ninth inning at App State, and then followed with three hits Tuesday at Georgia.

> Georgia State won its Sun Belt series against rival Georgia Southern (April 1-3). After a tough loss in Game 1, the Panthers bounced back with a 7-6, 10-inning victory on Blaine Marchman's walk-off single. In Game 3, Georgia State scored two runs in the seventh inning, including Will Mize's go-ahead, RBI-double, to clinch the series with a 3-2 victory.

> Facing the nation's toughest non-conference schedule, the Panthers opened the season with 18 straight games against Power 5 opponents, including 14 nationally-ranked foes.

> Georgia State played its first 14 games against ranked foes, including four victories:
No. 14 West Virginia twice, 7-6 (10) and 20-4 (home)
No. 2 Vanderbilt, 4-2 (away)
No. 10 Georgia Tech, 10-1 (away)

> The Panthers earned a Friday night, 4-2 victory at No. 2 Vanderbilt (Feb. 26), the highest-ranked team GSU has ever beaten. Previously, the highest ranked team GSU had ever defeated was No. 3 Georgia Tech in 2010, 10-1. 

> In the win over Vandy, starting pitcher Ryan Watson threw five strong innings (1 run, 4 hits, 7 strikeouts) and Elian Merejo provided key insurance runs with a two-run homer in the top of the ninth inning. Vandy put the tying runs on base in the bottom of the ninth, but Chad Treadway recorded the final two outs for the save.

> Freshman right-hander Mason Patel was named Sun Belt Conference Pitcher of the Week after leading GSU to a win at No. 10 Georgia Tech (March 3). He pitched six scoreless inning and allowed just four hits while striking out eight, the most strikeouts for a GSU freshman since 2013. Backing the strong pitching effort in the win at Tech were Will Mize (2-for-4, 2-run HR, 2B, 3 RBI) and Kyle Riesselmann (2-run HR, 3 RBI). 

> Georgia State opened the season with a four-game series split against No. 14 West Virginia. After falling 5-3 in 10 innings on Opening Day, Georgia State swept the Saturday doubleheader with a 7-6 walk-off win on Elian Merejo's two-out single in the 10th, and then a 20-4 victory in the nightcap. GSU then held WVU to just three hits in the series finale, but the Mountaineers managed a 3-2 victory.

> The Panthers' 20-4 win in Game 3 of the WVU series represents the most runs GSU has ever scored against a ranked foe. Georgia State jumped on the Mountaineers with an 11-run first inning and never looked back.

> Second-year head coach Brad Stromdahl took over the Georgia State program in 2020 after seven seasons as the head coach at Georgia Gwinnett, where he started the program from scratch in 2013 and compiled a record of 328-104. He led the Grizzlies to the Avista-NAIA World Series three times, including his last two years (2018-19). Before going to Georgia Gwinnett in November 2011, Stromdahl spent five seasons (2007-11) as an assistant coach at Georgia State.

SERIES VS. TROY
> Georgia State and Troy last met in 2019 in Atlanta, when the Trojans won the series, two games to one. The Panthers took the middle game, 12-5.

> The 2014 series in Georgia State's first year in the Sun Belt was the first between GSU and Troy since 2005, when both were members of the Atlantic Sun Conference. The two schools played annually as members of the TAAC/ASun from 1999-2005. Troy leads the overall series 36-13, including 12-6 in the Sun Belt era.