CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – Just two days after a crazy finish that overcame a 10-1 deficit and extended a nation-leading 12-game active win streak the Lamar University baseball team will return to Southland Conference action when it opens a three-game set at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Friday at 6 p.m. in Chapman Field.
 
The second game of the series is slated for 4 p.m. Saturday and the finale is scheduled for 1 p.m. Sunday afternoon.
 
When the first pitch is thrown Friday, it will mark the end of a 12-day stretch that the Cardinals (22-7, 7-2 Southland Conference) have played out of league action. In the 12 days, Lamar was 6-0 with wins over Texas, Abilene Christian and Nicholls.
 
Staring at a 10-1 shortfall by the middle of the fifth inning, the Cardinal bats woke up and ran off 13 unanswered runs to claim a 14-10 win over Nicholls, which had added five runs in the top of the frame to push it to that point.
 
Lamar responded with seven in the fifth, four of which were scored on back-to-back home runs from Reid Russell and Cutter McDowell. Russell pushed across Jake Nash in the sixth to cut the Colonel lead to 10-9, and the Stijn van der Meer extended his career-long hit streak to 19 games with a two-run double in the seventh that allowed the Cards to take a lead they wouldn't relinquish.
 
Big Red ended up adding insurance runs in the seventh and eighth innings and locked up the 12^th-straight win, one better than Southeast Missouri's 11-game active streak.  Florida has the longest streak of the season at 17 and the school record for consecutive wins is 20 (1979).
 
Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (11-17, 3-6) comes in with confidence after a 5-0 win at Texas on Tuesday and narrow loss to Texas State Wednesday.  Sunday's starter freshman Aaron Hernandez pitched a gem at Texas with 5.2 innings of work with nine punchouts.
 
Hernandez (2-3, 5.27 earned run average) has started two games with 14 appearances. He has 27.1 innings pitched with 16 earned runs allowed on 35 hits and 14 walks. He will face off against right-hander Jayson McKinley (2-0, 2.57), who has worked 42.0 innings in seven starts. McKinley has had a remarkable season in terms of strikeout-to-walk ratio on 35 strikeouts and just seven walks.
 
Friday's contest will feature two aces in LU's RHP Will Hibbs (5-1, 2.49) and the Islanders' LHP Chris Falwell (1-2, 2.32). Hibbs has started seven contests with 47 innings of work. He's allowed only 13 earned runs on 35 hits and notched 43 strikeouts. Falwell has six starts on the year, tied for the most on the team with Saturday's starter Devin Skapura (2-3, 2.88).
 
Falwell has allowed 11 earned runs in 42.2 innings pitched with 45 strikeouts and Skapura has worked 40.2 frames with 13 earned runs given up and 28 strikeouts. Skapura will face LU's Billy Love (2-1, 3.03), who is two games removed from his excellent complete-game outing against New Orleans. He's worked 32.2 innings in six starts with 11 earned runs and 26 strikeouts.
 
The Islanders have three athletes with .300-plus averages, led by Zack Gibson at .354. Gibson also tops the teams with 25 runs, just ahead of Casey Thomas at 21. Thomas ranks second in average at .353, in front of RBI leader Zacarias Hardy (.328/23).
 
Van der Meer has a hold of the top spot in the Cardinal average chase with a .363 mark. He is tied with Jake Nash for the team lead in runs scored (25), and Nash tops the team with 31 RBI, just ahead of Russell's 29. Russell's homer Wednesday gave him a Southland Conference leading 10.
 
After the three-game set, LU will end its brief four-game road trip Wednesday at Baylor in a 4 o'clock first pitch. The Cardinals return to The Beck on April 15 for a league-set against border rival McNeese State.