Hogs sweep EIU behind Kjerstad's huge weekend

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FAYETTEVILLE — Heston Kjerstad did Heston Kjerstad things Sunday afternoon.

The preseason All-American notched his second multi-home run game of the young season in Arkansas’ 12-3 win that completed a sweep of Eastern Illinois.

It is the seventh straight year the Razorbacks have swept their opening series and the 15th time in head coach Dave Van Horn’s 18 seasons.

Arkansas will be back at Baum-Walker Stadium this weekend for a four-game series against Gonzaga beginning Thursday. The Bulldogs are 1-2 at the Sanderson Ford College Baseball Classic in Surprise, Ariz., but play again Monday, so they’ll have a short turnaround.

Kjerstad Stays Hot

Two days after hitting two home runs in the opener, Kjerstad hit another pair of long balls in Sunday’s game. He finished 3 for 5 with six RBIs before being replaced by Curtis Washington Jr. as a pinch runner in the seventh inning.

Making his four-homer weekend even more impressive is that there was a steady and sometimes strong wind blowing in from right field all three days.

“He hit two balls against the wind today that got out of the park,” Van Horn said. “It really wasn’t a hitter’s weekend wind-wise as far as the way the park played. Most balls were getting knocked down, but he’s just a good hitter.”

Kjerstad actually noticed the weather conditions before the game and took a mental note that it might not work in his favor, so he was particularly thankful that both home runs left the park.

“I was actually thinking that if I got a ball it may get hung up in the wind,” Kjerstad said. “So I just went up to the plate hunting a good pitch to hit hard and luckily got enough of it to get two of them out, so happy with that.”

With two outs in the second inning, the junior from Amarillo, Texas, launched a moonshot off a hanging slider from Foster Anshutz that looked like it might have gone over or hit the scoreboard had it not been for the wind. It had just enough to get over the fence for a three-run homer that put Arkansas up 5-1.

After grounding out into the shift his next time up, Kjerstad crushed a fastball for a no-doubter that cleared the right field bullpen to lead off the sixth inning.

Eastern Illinois head coach Jason Anderson, who was an All-American at Illinois before pitching for the Yankees, Mets and Indians in the big leagues, spoke highly of him after the series.

“He reminds me of Paul De Jong of the Cardinals when he was in college at Illinois State and he obviously has a bright future ahead of him,” Anderson said. “We would have loved to have pitched around him, but they didn’t give us a chance to do it.

“We were able to pitch around (Casey) Martin a little bit, walk him a few times and go to the next guy, but it is just kind of hard when that line up is so good.”

The one time the Panthers had an open base to put him with an intentional walk was in the seventh, but the fourth-year coach wanted to see what his reliever, Ben Stephens, could do against him.

The result was Kjerstad crushing a first-pitch fastball to dead center. It stayed in the park, but hit off the bottom of the wall for a two-run double.

“I’m kind of running out of words,” Opitz said. “He’s been doing the same thing for three years. So, he’s just going to keep doing it this year. It’s fun to watch. It’s fun to have him on our team

Kjerstad came into the game with an incredible 1.429 slugging percentage, but still managed to increase it with his performance Sunday afternoon.

He went 7 for 12 with one double, four home runs, 10 RBIs and two walks over the weekend, giving him a .583/.643/1.667 slash.

“He hasn’t stopped hitting since he walked back on campus for his junior year,” Van Horn said. “He’s taking more pitches, he’s being a little more patient, not going after balls in the dirt as much, not pressing. … He’s really developing as a hitter. He’s learning and he’s going to be a tough out this year.”

The two home runs also moved Kjerstad past Jake Duggar and into a tie with Greg D’Alexander (1987-90) and Rodney Nye (1998-99) for seventh on the UA’s career list with 35.

Former big leaguer and current Arkansas radio color commentator Bubba Carpenter - who also played for the Razorbacks - actually said during Friday’s broadcast that he thought Kjerstad could hit in a Major League lineup already.

“That’s a bold statement because those big leaguers would probably take offense to that because they had to work their way there,” Van Horn said. “But Heston’s well on his way.”

Hogs Strike First (Again)

For the third straight day, leadoff man Braydon Webb scored the first run of the game in the home half of the first inning.

After walking and coming around on an RBI single Friday and leading off Saturday’s game with a home run, the junior college transfer lined a single into left field to get things started Sunday. Webb eventually scored on an RBI single by Matt Goodheart.

“That’s what we want him to do, is just get on base,” Van Horn said. “He took some of his at-bats deep into counts where he saw six, seven, eight, nine pitches. I thought he did a super job.”

In the next at bat, Casey Martin tried to lay down a squeeze, but he bunted right back to the pitcher. A good throw would have gotten Christian Franklin at the plate, but Foster Anshutz bounced it and the catcher couldn’t make the play. The error made it 2-0.

Webb finished the series 5 for 14 (.357) with a team-high seven runs.

“It’s surreal just the atmosphere here,” Webb said. “I wouldn’t want to play anywhere else. The guys on this team, they’re just so supportive and we’ve been working hard for this.”

Other Tidbits

~It was an overcast day with temperatures in the mid-50s Sunday, but the Razorbacks still had an official attendance of 9,116 (tickets distributed) - with 5,694 tickets scanned. For the weekend, Baum-Walker Stadium drew 18,458 fans (scanned) and had an official attendance of 29,118. That was just shy of the opening weekend record of 29,354 set in 2017 against Miami (Ohio)

~Freshman Blake Adams got the Game 3 nod and gave up two earned runs in three innings. The right-hander from Springdale Har-Ber retired EIU in order in the first, but gave up six hits and one walk over the next couple of innings. It would have been much worse had he not induced a double play to escape a bases-loaded, one-out jam in the third.

~Robert Moore went just 1 for 12 with four strikeouts over the weekend, but the 17-year-old hit several balls hard either right to an outfielder or - like on Sunday - the outfielder made a good play to catch it. “Not really concerned about his batting average,” Van Horn said. “I just want him to play defense. The hits are going to come.”

~Despite making only two starts and posting a 5.25 ERA, right-hander Kole Ramage was second on the team with seven wins last season. Most of them came after he relieved a starter - usually Connor Noland - before he went five innings, earning him the nickname, “The Vulture.” He did it again Sunday, replacing Adams in the fourth and throwing two scoreless innings. There’s a chance he could start one of the four Gonzaga games next weekend. “Ramage came out there and looked like he was going to get after it, then he kind of faded out a little bit,” Van Horn said. “We wanted to get him two innings today.”

~With sweeps over them to start the 2019 and 2020 seasons, Arkansas is now 32-2 all-time against the Panthers. The two losses came in 1998 (5-4) and 2016 (10-8).