A high-character leader for TLU Baseball, Brendan Beard is at the center of the Bulldogs’ charge towards the postseason
Beard has thrown back-to-back complete games in each of his last two starts for the Bulldogs
19 innings pitched. 13 strikeouts. 1 earned run surrendered. Two complete games. Two key victories.
TLU starting pitcher Brendan Beard has been on fire the last two weekends. He needed 161 pitches, 100 of which were strikes, to get past 14th-ranked Trinity on the road last Friday evening in a complete-game effort. A week prior to that, he went a full 10 innings on the mound against Schreiner, retiring 26 straight batters, tallying nine strikeouts, as he helped seal the Bulldogs’ 2-1 win.
10-inning complete games are few and far between in college baseball, and performances such as that one have highlighted Beard’s invaluable contributions to TLU’s success thus far.
“I think it starts with a mind switch at the end of last year,” first-year TLU head coach Kyle Palmer said of Beard. “He was a big part of the team last year in a relief pitching role, and realized pretty early on right after that season was over that he was going to have to be “a guy” for this team, no matter who was leading it.”
That included, as Palmer said, the ability to work deep into games when necessary. With the parity in the SCAC, every series holds great importance. And as the Game 1 starter, Beard plays a notable role in determining the momentum with which TLU opens each weekend.
“He was going to have to flip that switch to go the distance whenever the team needed him, whether that be in a relief role or a starting role,” Palmer added.
Beard, a senior from Coldspring, Texas, has repeatedly answered that call. His 2.01 ERA ranks fourth in the SCAC, and he is the only pitcher in the league with three complete games this season. He is third in strikeouts (61), and has the fewest walks (8) of anyone in the SCAC with five or more starts this season.
But the 6’6, 230-pound right-hander has meant more to this year’s TLU squad than what the stats will tell.
“From the moment I got the job, I just started calling guys [on the roster], and was like, ‘Hey, if you could pick one leader on the team, who would it be?,’” Palmer recalls. “[Brendan’s] name just continued to come up.
“I asked, ‘Why him? What are your thoughts?’ Nobody really said because of how good of a player he was. It was because of his work ethic, energy, and positivity. The way he approached every day. Through the fall, I saw that. He was always in the weight room. He was always pushing other guys to get them better.”
On Feb. 3, he made his first collegiate start, throwing five scoreless innings in a 12-3 win over Sul Ross State. Then came another shutout; this time a six-inning, 11-strikeout outing at Concordia on Feb. 9. For Palmer, one of his favorite memories of Beard this season came about a month later, when Beard came out of the bullpen in a 9-4 win over RPI on March 7. He tossed 2.1 innings, and struck out six of the seven batters he faced.
“We were struggling a little bit out of the bullpen and Brendan hadn’t pitched,” Palmer said. “I asked him, ‘Hey do you want to relieve?’ You should’ve seen the fire in his eyes. He said, ‘Absolutely’ and it was one of the most fun times for me to watch a guy in his element go out and close a game.”
As Beard has developed into one of the SCAC’s top starting pitchers, TLU has also turned the corner. An 0-5 start to conference play was far from ideal, but after disappointing weekends against St. Thomas and UDallas, the Bulldogs won eight of their next 10.
“We had that skid there, and there are a lot of people who have reached out to me, asking ‘What was the turning point? What was the difference?,’” Palmer, who played catcher at TLU from 2006-09, said. “You look at it, and we were putting our heads down and pushing forwards, even during that skid. Sometimes the ball just didn’t fall our way, or we didn’t make the pitch we needed to make, and the other team did make the pitch they needed to make.
“That’s how baseball goes. I hope my guys understand that from even before then, I’ve been really proud of their effort and focus. And their willingness to push forward and not be so focused on the outcomes and things we can’t control.”
They are in the midst of arguably their toughest stretch of conference play, getting the top two teams in the league back-to-back. Last weekend, it was Trinity. This weekend, it’s Centenary, who enters with an 11-3 SCAC record. With six SCAC games left in the regular season, maximizing their final three home games of 2024 is certainly on the Bulldogs’ minds.
“I’ve gone up against Mike Diaz and his Centenary teams for a long time,” Palmer noted. “They’re always prepared and they’re always ready. You have to come in and be prepared to play them from pitch one. If you don’t, they will run all over you. I enjoy that piece; it keeps me on my toes, and gives me a chance to play against one of the best-coached teams out there.”
Numbers of the Week
2 straight seasons in which LeTourneau softball’s Maddie Flanery has tallied at least 30 stolen bases in a season. She is the only player in program history to reach that mark, and with her six stolen bases in last weekend’s series at McMurry, set a new program record for single-season stolen bases, with 35. On top of that, the sophomore from Tyler, Texas became the Yellowjackets’ new program record holder in stolen bases, doing in just two years what it took previous record holder Courtney Matulis four years to do: steal more than 60 bases in a career. Flanery now has 65…and counting.
10 unanswered runs scored by ETBU Baseball in the 9th inning of the Tigers’ 12-10 road win at Hendrix College on Wednesday. The visitors from Marshall trailed 7-2 entering the top half of the ninth but an offensive eruption soon turned the tide and left Hendrix stunned. 13 batters stepped to the plate in the inning as ETBU tallied seven hits, including Brett Wagner’s three-run homer for an 8-7 lead. Hendrix used three different pitchers in the inning.
.470 is the on-base percentage for Texas Lutheran Softball heading into this weekend’s home series against Trinity. The Bulldogs are the best team in Division III when it comes to reaching base at a consistent rate and only one other team in the NCAA (all divisions) currently has a higher on-base percentage: The University of Oklahoma, who is currently ranked No. 2 in the NFCA Division I Top 25. That number is helped by the efforts of Caelee Clark, who is hitting .500 and has a .554 OBP in 25 games this season.
LeTourneau on the move: SCAC set to gain another member starting in 2025
Per a report from Dave Campebell’s Texas Football on Wednesday evening, LeTourneau is quickly nearing the end of its time in the American Southwest Conference. The Yellowjackets, who have been part of the ASC since 1998, are the latest in a long line of ASC institutions that have announced future conference plans within the last two years.
LETU’s landing spot, according to the report, is the SCAC. LETU, who does not sponsor football, would increase the SCAC’s total number of full members to 11 in 2025-26, as the league is set to add McMurry, Concordia, and Ozarks this fall, but will also lose Trinity and Southwestern to the SAA in 2025. Meanwhile, the ASC will be down to just four members in 2025, which also will mark the second—and final—year of the NCAA grace period for the ASC to retain its automatic bid to the D-III football playoffs with under six football-playing institutions.
LeTourneau is expected to formally accept the SCAC’s invitation to join the league in the coming weeks. Read the full report from DCTF here.
Baseball
ETBU: #4 (D3baseball.com Top 25), #3 (Perfect Game USA Top 25)
Trinity: #12 (D3baseball.com Top 25), #17 (Perfect Game USA Top 25)
Softball
ETBU: #3 (NFCA Top 25)
Texas Lutheran: #11 (NFCA Top 25)
Acrobatics & Tumbling
UMHB: #5 (NCATA National Rankings)
Women’s Tennis
Trinity: #14 (ITA Division III Top 50)Southwestern: #41 (ITA Division III Top 50)
Men’s Tennis
Trinity: #6 (ITA Division III Top 50)
Southwestern: #31 (ITA Division III Top 50)
Concordia: #50 (ITA Division III Top 50)
Know of a friend, family member, or fan who is interested in Texas’ D3 sports scene? Please feel free to share this newsletter and help us reach more supporters of the Lone Star State’s D-III programs!
Also, be sure to follow us on Twitter at @TXD3News. Have a great rest of your week!