SHREVEPORT, La. – Coming off of its most productive offensive output of the young season, McMurry University head coach John Byington would like to see his team continue its recent offensive efforts in this weekend's three-game non-conference series at Centenary. The War Hawks (2-8) and Gents (5-3) play a single game on Friday (6 p.m.) and a doubleheader on Saturday (1 p.m.) at Shehee Stadium.

“They will be a good team,” Byington said. “They were a Division I program last season and, even though they lost some players (when changing to Division III), they still have some strong holdovers. Their hitting stats look very strong.”

The Gents are coming off of a three-game set at perennial power Trinity University. Centenary dropped two of the three bouts, winning the series finale, 6-5.

McMurry had a four-game road trip to the Phoenix area last weekend, where it lost to the nation's No. 4 team (Linfield) before also falling to Pacific Lutheran and Whittier College.  On the last day of the trip, the War Hawks had an offensive explosion in a 20-14 win over Claremont-McKenna College. The 20 runs matched McMurry's output in its prior six games combined.

“We're making progress,” Byington said. “We are on the right track. Our hitting got better as the weekend went on (in Phoenix).”

Dylan De Leon leads McMurry's offense with a .387 batting average. DeLeon shares the team lead with six runs scored, to go along with three doubles and a homerun. He also has a .457 on-base percentage.

Hunter Lane and Zack Hagan are also hitting well in the early going. Lane is at .333 in his 15 at-bats, while Hagan is right on the .300 plateau (3-10).  Lane has a team-leading four doubles in four games played, thus far.

Starting pitcher Zack Matthys (0-1) has a 2.57 earned run average for his two starts. David Towler (0-2) is winless, despite a creditable 3.75 ERA and an 18-to-8 strikeout-to-walk ratio.