Page Twelve IN A NON-CONFERENCE BATTLE: THE MICHIGAN DAILY Wednesday, May 11, 1977 Blue By RICK MADDOCK It's time for Michigan base- ball coach Moby Benedict and his squad to forget about the Big Ten race. They should not be thinking about the standings which shows they are one game behind Minnesota. Instead, the Wolverines should be concentrating on Bowling Green. The Falcons, who split with Michigan on April 9th at Bowling Green, invadc Fisher Field today at 2 p.m Of course, Michigan will still have dreams of that third consecutive title dancing in its head. But then maybe the title shot will give Michigan more incentive against Bowl- ing Green. "What it (winning the Big Ten hosts Falcons in twin bill title) takes is for you to win. The way to win is to play one game at a time," Benedict said. "I believe winning breeds winning. You can't go into the Bowling Green game without winning and then expect to go into the conference games," he added. Probable pitchers for the game are: Kevin Clinton and Tom Owens for Michigan and Mike Oleksak and Gary Kite for Bowling Green. Southpaw Clinton is 3-1, with a 2.40 ERA in 15 inning pitched. "I better give him a chance to pitch," Benedict said. "He's pitched in 25 games all in the bullpen." Owens, a right hander, is 0-2 with a 5.12 ERA. Be has hurled in 17 innings.' Both Bowling Green probab- les are left handers. Oleksak is 4-0 with a 2.14 ERA. Kite is 3-0, with a 4.05 ERA. They are the fifth and sixth men on the Falcon pitching staff. The Falcons are currently 30-12, but only 1-3 in the Mid- America Conference (MAC), which is good for eighth place. Bowling Green has had six MAC games rained out. The only MAC teams B.G. faced were first place Miami, 9-2 in the conference, 39-9 overall, and Toledo, the MAC's second place team. Chuck Black, a shortstop, is the Falcons' leading hitter at .371. Larry Owen, a senior catcher who has been the B. G. receiver since he was a fresh- man, is batting .368 including 14 home runs. He's second in the nation in home run production, Owen is also ninth in the na- tion in RBI's with 47. He has a career average of .338, and he has 28 career home runs, which broke the MAC's re- cord. The Philadelphia Phil- lies' Mike Schmidt held the record with 27 when he play- ed for Ohio. Before yesterday's sweep of Findlay College, Bowling Green had a .310 batting average and a 3.56 staff ERA. The Falcons had a .962 fielding average, be- fore yesterday. The Falcons feel they still have a shot at the MAC title, but they know they must win at least 12 of their 14 conference games. "It looks like the rain- outs are going to cost us the championship," said a team spokesman. Bowling Green double-dip- ped Findlay College, yester- day, 6-1 and 8-1. Jeff Lee, playing at catcher giving Owen a rest went two-for- three, including one RBI. Bowling Green went five-for- five in stealing in the game. The Falcons lashed out 12 hits in their 8-1 nightcap win. Third baseman Ron Manser was three-for-three with a RBI, and shortstop Pat Bryne, giv- ing Black a rest, smacked a double and a three-run homer. Owens, who was the designat- ed - hitter yesterday, went two- for-four in the nightcap. He broke his own MAC single sea- son total bases record. He cur- rently has 96 total bases. enough; 7-5 'M' baseball stats HITTING (At least 50 at bats) AB RI H HR RBI Anderson 102 18 35 0 12 Lane 92 13 29 0 16 Grenkoski 130 23 35 1 15 Leach 89 15 23 0 28 Wasilewski 105 12 27 2 17 Chapman 94 15 24 1 10 Mahan 95 5 24 0 13 Parker 81 12 20 1 11 Capoferi 50 7 12 1 5 Berra 96 12 22 3 8 TOTALS 1016 151 272 9 139 Opponents 938 93 199 6 81 PITCHING (At least 15 innings pitched) IP II ER W-L Howe 661/ 43 13 7-2 Clinton 15 15 4 31 McGinnis 50 35 15 5-1 Stennett 58 40 19 4-3 Perry 4W, 41 17 4-2 Owens 17 20 11 0-2 TOTALS 259', 199 80 23-11 Opponents 257 272 124 11-23 LeFlore HR in 9th not Twins outslug Tigers, AVG -343 .315 .269 .258 .257 .255 .253 .247 .240 .229 .268 .212 ERA 1.76 2.40 2.70 2.95 3.14 5.82 2.78 4.34 By DON MacLACHLAN and PAUL CAMPBELL special to The Daily DETROIT - I a battle of rookie left-handers last night, Minnesota's Jeff Holly had a little more luck and a little more help than Detroit's Bob Sykes. That little extra helped Holly and the division leading Twins hand Sykes his first major league loss, 7-5. SYKES STARTED strong, mowing down the first five Twins he faced, and collecting four strikeouts. But -ontrol problems allowed the Twins to reach him for two runs in the top of the second. Bob Randall's single followed a safety by Butch Wynegar and drove in Roy Smalley who had Wagner bounced one over Hol- reached first on a walk. ly's head for an infield single. Third baseman Jerry Terrell Ron LeFlore broke an 0-for-11 drove home Wynegar, but was hitting streak with a single and thrown by Ben Oglivie trying to after the speedy center fielder stretch his hit into a double. stole his seventh base of the season, Fuentes tied the game Bare sent down with a sharp two-run single to Bare sentdown left. The Detroit Tigers optioned The switch hitting Fuentes pitcher Ray Bare to their continued to destroy left-handed Evansville farm club of the pitching. His two-for-four night American Association. He boosted his s e a s o n average appeared in five games for against southpaws to .418. the Tigers, recording an 0-2 MINNESOTA regained t Ite record with a 12.56 ERA. lead in the sixth, after Skes had retired seven batters in a The Twins scored another row. With two out, Wynegar sin- pairainrthe third, when left field- gled to left. On the next pitch, er Barry Hisle blastedl a two- Wagner b o00 t e d Smalleys run homer into the upper deck gner bnd Randalmflle of the left field stands. it was grounder and Randall followed Hfishes efith stndsItrperswith a slashing two run double. Hle's eighth round tripper of sending Sykes to the showers. the year, and upped the Twin LeFlore gave the home fans BUT TIGER second baseman one last thrill when he smashed Tito Fuentes led his team's a two o1t upper deck home run comeback and continued to to right in the ninth. Holly pick- prove he may have been the ed up his second win in as many best deal in the recent free- starts-both at the expense of agent draft. the Tigers. The $90,000 ex-Padre, started the Tiger scoring in the fourth inning. He leaped out a triple S CO R ES and came home when Twins right fielder Dan Ford caught a long foul fly off Rusty Staub's Late baseball bat and threw to the plate a American League Toronto 9, Seattle 3 split second too late to catch Minnesota 7, Detroit 5 the sliding Fuentes. National League With two out in the fifth, and Montreal 4, Los Angeles 3 third baseman Phil Mankowski NHoLral 3, FINALS on first, Tiger shortstop Mark (Montreal leads series 2-0) Major League Standings AMERICAN LEAGUE NATIONAL LEAGUE East East W L Pet. GB W L Pt. to New York 16 10 .615 - Pittsburgh 18 7 .720 - Baltimore a 14 9 .649 o St. Louis -17 9 .654 1 Milwaukee 15 12 .556 1, Chicago 14 10 .583 3 Boston 14 12 .538 2 Montreal 12 10 .545 4 Toronto 13 17 .433 5 Philadelphia 12 12 .500 V Detroit 10 15 4.400 5 New York 10 1 .385 8 Cleveland 16 .360 6 west West Los Angeles 22 5 .815 - Minnesota 18 10 .643 - San Francisco 12 16 .424 10 Chicago 17 10 .630 1 Houston 11 17 .393 11'. Texas 13 11 .542 3 Cincinnati 10 16 .385111% Kansas City 15 13 .536 3 San Diego 11 19 .367 12? Oakland 15 14 .517 4'/ Atlanta 8 20 .286 14 California 11 17 .393 7 Seattle 9 23 .281 11 Yesterday's Games Yesterday's Games Pittsburgh 3, Atlanta 0 Cleveland 1, Milwaukee 0 Philadelphia 3, San Francisco 0 Late games not included. San Diego at New York, ppd. Today's Gaines Late games not included Boston Jenkins (4-1) at Oakland Today's Games Medich (1-2) Los Angeles John (2-1) at Mon- Milwaukee Augustine (3-3) at treal Stanhouse (3-3), n Cleveland Dobson (0-3), n San Francisco McGlothen (1-3) at Minnesota Zahn (5-0) at Detroit Philadelphia Christenson (2-3), n Roberts (2-4), n Atlanta La Corte .1-4) at Pitts- Chicago Knapp (3-1) at Texas burgh Candelaria (3-0), n Alexander "(4-1), a San Diego Sawyer (1-3) at Newr New York Holtzman (2-1) at seat- York swan (1-3), a tIe Abbott (04), n Cincinnati Aleata (1-1) at St. Baltimore Grimsley (3-1) at Cali- Louis Rasmussen (2-3), a tornya Tanana (4-1), aChicagonorris (4-3) at Hoosts0 only games scheduled McLaughlin (0-1), is MILWAUKEE BREWER third baseman .Sal Bando gets out of the way of a high fastball thrown by Cleveland's Jim Bibby. The Indian hurler tossed a five hit shutout, raising his record to 2-0. The Indians scored their only run in the bottom of the ninth when Larvell Blanks hit a. one-out homer.