BOONE, N.C. – App State baseball takes aim at a fourth straight Sun Belt series win this week as the team hosts James Madison in a three-game series Thursday through Saturday. First pitch on Thursday and Friday is set for 6 p.m., with the series finale slated for 1 p.m. on Saturday. All three games will be broadcast on ESPN+.
Thursday is Throwback Thursday, where the first 100 fans will receive a throwback logo sticker. App State retro hats will also be available for purchase in-stadium. Fans can purchase a grass seat down the right field line for just $5
at this link until 1 p.m. on Thursday. Friday is Military Appreciation Night, and the first 150 fans will receive an App State American Flag Block A T-shirt. Admission is free for all active and retired military members. Saturday is Easter at the Ballpark, featuring a postgame Easter Egg Hunt for kids age 12 and younger.
SCOUTING THE MOUNTAINEERS
App State enters the series 19-17 on the season and 9-6 in Sun Belt play. App State was unable to overcome a big bottom of the third inning in an 8-4 loss at Duke on Tuesday. Prior to that, the Mountaineers defeated Marshall on the road last weekend.
Caleb Cross delivered a complete game shutout on Friday night on his way to earning Sun Belt Pitcher of the Week honors. The offense rallied for an extra-inning win to take the rubber match on Sunday. App State leads the Sun Belt in batting average, hits, doubles, runs-per-game, sacrifice flies and shutouts this season.
Tyler Lichtenberger paces App State at the plate, batting a league-leading .408 on the season, while
Juan Correa leads App State in the power department with 11 home runs and 38 RBIs.
Kameron Miller joins the duo as another Mountaineer who owns an OPS above 1.000. Friday starter
Caleb Cross has won each of his last three starts for the Mountaineers, posting a 0.75 ERA over that span, while
Bradley Wilson boasts a 3.57 ERA out of the bullpen.
SCOUTING THE DUKES
James Madison enters the series 12-25 on the season and 5-10 in Sun Belt play. The Dukes have lost three straight, dropping last weekend's series against No. 20 Troy and falling by a run in a midweek contest against George Mason on Tuesday. The Dukes are coming off a 36-win season in 2024 that saw them reach the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2011. This season, JMU was picked sixth in the Sun Belt preseason poll, with reliever Max Kuhle (who will make his first start this weekend) and DH/outfielder Ryan Dooley selected to the preseason all-conference team. Coleman Calabrese leads the offense with a .266 average, three home runs and 14 RBIs, but JMU as a team is batting just .216 on the year. They do like to run, stealing 65 bases in 84 tries. Right-hander Jackson Logar leads the Dukes' pitching staff with a 3-3 record and a 2.55 ERA through nine starts this season.
SERIES HISTORY
App State and James Madison have met eight times in program history, including seven meetings in the past two seasons since the Dukes. JMU leads the head-to-head series 5-3 and swept the Mountaineers in last season's series in Harrisonburg.
LICHTENBERGER LEADS THE WAY
Freshman shortstop
Tyler Lichtenberger was inserted into the starting lineup the second game of the season and hasn't looked back, reaching base safely in 33 of 34 games played on the campaign, including hits in 30 of those contests. Lichtenberger is batting .408 on the season with leads the Sun Belt, while he also ranks among league leaders in hits (T-2
nd – 53), OBP (7
th - .481), and sac flies (T-10
th – 3). On March 28 against Old Dominion, Lichtenberger tallied a career-high four hits, including his first collegiate home run. His .408 average ranks 24
th nationally and third among freshmen. Lichtenberger is batting .463 in Sun Belt play.
UNTOUCHABLE
Redshirt senior
Caleb Cross has been lights out on the mound in his last three starts. In consecutive outings, Cross has thrown seven no-hit innings, an eight-inning complete game and a nine-inning shutout, winning all three of those starts. His ERA is 0.75 over his last three outings, allowing just two earned runs in 24 innings. He has struck out 14 batters while allowing just 20 combined walks and hits over that span. Cross has lowered his ERA to 2.92 which ranks seventh in the Sun Belt, while his five victories this season are tied for fourth in the league.
Cross was named the Sun Belt Pitcher of the Week on Tuesday following his complete game shutout against Marshall on April 11. Cross joins
Caleb Marks (March 8 vs. College of Charleston) as Mountaineer pitchers who have thrown a nine-inning, complete-game shutout this season. It marks the first time since Sam Agnew-Wieland threw two complete-game shutouts for App State in 2013 that the Mountaineers have achieved the feat twice in the same year. The duo joins Northwestern State's Trent Hillen and Dylan Marionneaux as the only pair of teammates in college baseball this season to have thrown nine-inning, complete-game shutouts.
DOUBLE TROUBLE
Through 36 games this season, the App State offense has registered 83 doubles which leads the Sun Belt and ranks 18th nationally.
Braxton Church and
Tyler Figueroa lead the charge with a dozen double apiece. The record for doubles in a season is 168, set in 2007. Individually, David Rubinstein owns the program record with 30 doubles in 2007.
BULLPEN BRAD
After serving as the Mountaineers' Friday night starter last season,
Bradley Wilson has found lots of success coming out of the App State bullpen in 2025. On March 29 against Old Dominion, Wilson threw a career-high 7.0 scoreless innings to earn the win in relief. He allowed just three base runners – all singles – and retired the final 17 batters of the ballgame. The graduate student has allowed one earned run or fewer in 13 of his 17 outings this season. He boasts a 3.57 ERA and has struck out 32 strikeouts in 40.1 innings of work this season, with opponents hitting just .213 against him.
KAM GOES BAM
App State sophomore
Kameron Miller has been on a tear at the plate, reaching base safely in 23 consecutive games. Miller has belted nine home runs this season including a 471-foot missile against Western Carolina on Tuesday, the longest measured for an App State player in the TrackMan Era (since 2019). Miller ranks among Sun Belt leaders in OPS (4
th – 1.134), on-base (5
th – .489), walks (7
th – 28), RBIs (T-5
th – 37), slugging (7
th - .645), home runs (T-8
th – 9) and batting average (9
th – .346). After not working a single walk in 48 at-bats last season,
Kameron Miller has transformed himself into a very patient hitter in 2025, working a team-leading 28 times this season and 24 times in his last 19 games played, including a career-high four walks against Gardner-Webb on Feb. 28.
JUAN GONE
App State first baseman
Juan Correa hit his 11th home run of the season in a victory ULM on April 4. The senior has now slugged 11 home runs through his first 31 games, including a trio of two-homer games – against Queens, UMass Lowell and Wake Forest – to rank 63rd nationally in home runs, despite missing five games due to injury. Correa ranks among conference leaders in home runs (T-5
th – 11), RBIs (4th – 38), and slugging (8
th – .641). Last season with the Charlotte 49ers, Correa finished the campaign with 12 home runs in 55 games played but never homered twice in the same contest. His 12 home runs were second on the 49ers and tied for 10
th in the conference. Correa has hit safely in 25 of 30 games this season (in which he has recorded an official at-bat) including a ten-game hitting streak.
FANTASTIC FIG
Sophomore
Tyler Figueroa has been a valuable addition, joining the Mountaineers this season as a transfer from Siena. Was named the Sun Belt Player of the Week on April 8 after hitting three home runs and driving in 10 runs in four games the previous week against Western Carolina and ULM. Figueroa is the only Mountaineer to start all 36 games this season, appearing in games at second base, third base, left field and center field. Figueroa recorded a 19-game on-base streak from March 7 to April 6. He ranks second on the team with 26 walks, contributing to a .923 OPS on the season. He also paces the Mountaineers' running game, swiping six bags in seven tries.
FOR THE GREATER GOOD
App State has hit 25 sacrifice flies this season which leads the Sun Belt and ranks 7th in the country. Eleven different players have hit at least one sac fly, with
Braxton Church's six sac flies leading the team. For comparison, App State finished 2024 with 25 sacrifice flies.
GONE FISHING
Redshirt junior
Jordan Fisher has acceded from a walk-on in 2022 to a high-leverage reliever this season. Fisher struck out the side with the bases loaded in the 11
th inning on March 15 to earn the win against Texas State and followed with two more strikeouts in the ninth inning the following day to secure the save. Fisher's five saves this season rank fifth in the Sun Belt and one away from the top-10 in App State single-season history. He has struck out 29 batters in 19.1 innings good for a 13.5 K/9 rate. Fisher's 17 appearances this season are tied for the team lead and tied for third-most in the conference.
SOME ZA DELIVERY
Senior second baseman
Joseph Zamora helped the Mountaineers secure their first series win against Texas State with a walk-off single in the 11
th inning on March 15 and hit a game-tying double in the ninth inning on March 25 to force extra-innings against High Point. Through 30 games played this season Zamora is batting .333 with 28 RBIs and 29 runs scored. Zamora has struck out just 14 times in 147 plate appearances this season, making him the sixth-toughest player to strike out in the Sun Belt. He also made No. 2 on SportsCenter's Top-10 countdown for his diving catch in foul territory on which he covered 109 feet in the April 11 win over Marshall.
STRIKE THROWERS
App State's pitching staff has opened the 2025 season by consistently throwing strikes and getting ahead in counts. After issuing over six walks-per-nine innings in 2023, the Mountaineers trimmed that number to 5.4 walks-per-nine in 2024. So far in 2025, App State's walks-per-nine has dropped to 4.5. App State has walked four batters or fewer 20 times through 36 games, including two walk-free games.
SUPERB SUN BELT
The Sun Belt continues to be one of the top conferences in college baseball. Troy, Coastal Carolina and Southern Miss are all ranked in this week's D1Baseball top-25, while six Sun Belt schools rank in the top-100 nationally in RPI. Last year the league finished with nine teams in the top-100, with four making the NCAA Tournament.
UP NEXT
App State continue its seven-game homestand by hosting ETSU on Tuesday at 6 p.m. to close out the home-and-home series with the Bucs. The game will be broadcast on ESPN+.
