Q&A with TLU's Brendan Beard, Track titles for McMurry and Trinity, Clark sets new NCAA record
Two weeks ago, we reported on Texas Lutheran baseball and the Bulldogs’ right-handed ace, Brendan Beard. The senior has had quite the journey to stepping into the Friday night starting role on the mound for TLU this season, where he has posted a 2.32 ERA in SCAC play, averaging 7.17 strikeouts/9 innings. Notably, he tossed a complete 10-inning game in a 2-1 win over Schreiner on April 5, and followed a week later with a nine-inning shutout of eventual SCAC regular season champion Trinity.
Additionally, noted for his high character, Beard earned this year’s Mark Love Award for TLU baseball, a high honor within the Bulldogs’ program. An award recognizing the legacy of TLU baseball alum Mark Love ‘80, the honor celebrates a member of the team who displays qualities of team leadership, charm, resilience, and dependability. Beard certainly exemplifies those attributes.
Now, just three weeks after shutting out Trinity in San Antonio, as TLU heads into a SCAC Tournament matchup with Trinity on Friday, we caught up with Beard, to discuss his career in Seguin, what brought him to TLU, and the transition from reliever to starter on the Bulldog pitching staff this season.
You were a reliever for your first three seasons at TLU, and were exceptional in that role, leading the team in saves and strikeouts last season. Now you switch into a starting role this season. What has that transition been like?
“It was an adjustment at first. Coming out of the pen, you’re kind of on edge and always ready to go, because you never know when your number is going to get called. You get to watch the game, see what pitches are working that day for guys on the mound. And then you can play off of that information.
“But you can’t really do that as the Friday night starter, because you haven’t seen [the opposing hitters] at all. Towards the beginning of the season, that was a big adjustment I had to get over, but I took a step back and said, ‘I’ve put in the work. I know my stuff is good. I just have to go out and do what I can do. And whatever [the hitters] do, I just have to live with.’ It’s putting faith in myself and whether it’s starting or relieving, whatever they need me to do, going out there and doing the best I can and preparing the best I can. It’s living with the results and knowing that you put in the work to be successful. I think that’s where the confidence comes from.”
You’ve stepped into a significant leadership role this season especially. Where does that ability to step up come from?
“It goes all the way back to my sophomore year. I was really blessed to have a really strong senior class, basically my whole time here honestly. All of those seniors who have come before me have paved the way and laid the framework for how things are supposed to be done, when to chew someone out, when to be supportive. My freshman year was the Covid year, and that got cut short. So I wasn’t familiar with the teams in the conference, but all I heard was ‘Trinity is the team to beat’. Covid happened and we come back the next year, and all of those senior guys, I looked up to them so much. They led us there and we got to the conference tournament. And then we ended up coming back from five runs in the eighth inning of the championship vs Trinity and won the tournament and went to a regional. So from early on in my career, it showed me that baseball is a crazy sport. Anything can happen, and you just have to believe in your team and believe in yourself.”
Your ability to pitch late into games has been super impressive, considering the quality of hitters you’re facing in the SCAC and how beneficial that is to saving the bullpen for Games 2 and 3 in those weekend series. Has that always been a strength of yours on the mound?
“I never really thought that I could throw complete games, just because I’d always thrown 3 or 4 innings at a time, and my body would be sore. I try not to think about my body too much while I’m in the game, and instead focus more on the next pitch. I was almost going to ask my pitch count during the eighth inning of that Trinity game, but decided not to, because I figured I would sike myself out and get in my own head. I thought, ‘Just take each pitch at a time.’ That’s all I can do. Try to execute one pitch at a time and hope everything works out. I’m always focused on the next pitch and I think that’s what keeps me going.”
Trinity has always been one of the top teams in the conference. As a competitor, how much do you enjoy going up against an opponent of that caliber?
“It’s definitely a rivalry, but it’s not a nasty rivalry. I think we both have a lot of respect for each other, and we know that every time we have a weekend series against Trinity, it’s going to be really, really good baseball. They’re a bunch of classy guys. I worked with Trinity’s coach over the summer, working Five-Tool tournaments in San Antonio. And obviously their assistant coach is our old assistant coach so I have a lot of connections there. It’s always fun to go in there and know that it’s going to be a good game. When you’re throwing the shutout, you just want to keep throwing more. It made it that much more special, I guess, knowing that secretly those coaches are proud of me, because we are friends. Their coach actually tossed me a game ball and that was really cool as well. It was pretty magical. I was feeling my stuff, my body was feeling good, and playing Trinity, your emotions are high, your adrenaline is high. I was riding that for the whole game.”
You were a First-Team All-District selection in both baseball and football at Coldspring-Oakhurst High School. What ultimately led to your decision to take your talents to Seguin for college?
“TLU was actually my only offer to play baseball. I threw maybe 82, so I didn’t get a lot of looks. But I was meeting one day with a bunch of my high school friends and I got a call from Coach [Rick] Heines. He was interested in my height. He was like, ‘We don’t have a lot of guys that are 6’6 running around on the field.’ I had gotten a bunch of football offers, though, and was actually going to go to Stephen F. Austin as a walk-on, because I had no baseball offers. But I got that call and dropped everything, and said, ‘I’m going to TLU.’ Greg Burnett was the head coach at the time, and I really clicked with him and Coach Heines. It seemed like an awesome place.”
So baseball was always your No. 1 sport, even with your football success in high school?
“Football could never even come close to baseball. I’ve been playing since T-Ball, and I think I started football in 6th grade. It’s always been a part of my life. I knew that if I ever got an opportunity to play baseball—it could’ve been an NAIA school in Wisconsin—I probably would take the offer.”
You mentioned it, but how was it navigating Covid with your freshman season getting cut short?
“I was actually thinking about not coming back to school after my freshman year, and just going into the job market. A couple things happened my freshman year, and I was kind of in a bad headspace. Like two weeks before the season ended, I got called up in a jersey and then obviously got sent home shortly after. I thought, ‘Oh man, I just got my chance and then it got ruined. So I’m going to go back for one more year and see how I like it, and if not, I’m going to drop out again. And as I said, we ended up winning the conference tournament in a crazy 16-15 game vs Trinity and I was like ‘This is the best. I’m here for life.’”
Championship News
McMurry Track & Field sweeps ASC team titles
The McMurry track & field programs will leave the ASC as champions…four years straight.
The Warhawk men and women claimed the ASC men’s and women’s track & field team titles over the weekend in Abilene in dominant fashion, continuing a streak of championships that has spanned half a decade for the men and four years for the women. The women put up 317 points over the three-day meet, besting second-place Hardin-Simmons by 151 points. And on the men’s side, McMurry’s 263 points outpaced second-place ETBU by a 99-point margin.
>> Sprinting to success: McMurry’s Dazhaun Walton finished as the ASC Outstanding Track Athlete on the men’s side, taking titles in both the 100m and 200m. Walton crossed the line in a blistering 10.36 seconds in the 100, good enough for the 5th-fastest time in D-III this season. His 200m time? 20.95 seconds, also the 5th-quickest time amongst D-III sprinters this season.
>> Down goes another record! A week after setting a new LeTourneau record in the 400m hurdles, Ellie Marsh took home ASC Outstanding Track Athlete honors in the women’s meet. And for good reason. Marsh broke the ASC meet record in the women’s 400m hurdles by a full second, crossing the line in 1:02.80, as she surpassed the previous mark of 1:03.85, set by Hardin-Simmons’ Ashley Huston 15 years ago in 2009. It is currently the 11th-fastest time in D-III track this season.
>> A legacy of dominance on the track: McMurry, who will join the SCAC in the fall of 2024, leaves the ASC as the most accomplished men’s and women’s track & field program in the conference’s history. The Warhawks won 16 women’s team titles and 20 men’s team titles over the course of two stints and 26 years in the ASC.
Trinity men take fourth-straight SCAC title, Win conference championship on their home track
A streak of consecutive conference championships also continued in San Antonio over the weekend, as Trinity's men's track & field team won its fourth consecutive Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference Championship pulling away from the field on the second day of competition. As it turned out, the Tigers took the title rather handily, with 272.5 points, 85.5 more than second-place Texas Lutheran.
>> Same incredible performance, Second year: Trinity’s Justin Johnson earned the Male Athlete of the Meet award from the SCAC for the second straight year, getting it done both in the field events and on the track. In Sunday’s triple jump, Johnson defended his 2023 conference title with a new personal best of 14.42 meters, the second-best mark in Trinity history. The day prior, he won his third consecutive 400 hurdles crown, clocking a time of 53.51, and also finished fourth overall in the 110 hurdles. He took third place in the long jump, and ran the second leg on the men’s 4x400 relay that broke the program record in a time of 3:14.75, closing the meet with a statement victory for the Tigers. That came out to a total of 31 points individually, plus the 10 he helped garner as part of the relay team.
>> Relay records: In addition to the Trinity 4x400 record, the Texas Lutheran men took down the 4x100 record, crossing the line in a blistering time of 40.81 seconds. It marks the fourth-fastest time run in D-III men’s T&F this season, as the quartet of Justin Freeney, Bryce Powell-Chimene, Rickey Franks, Weston Guzman will be a top contender for a podium spot at the NCAA Championships.
>> Women’s SCAC Championship: Colorado College snapped Trinity’s streak of eight straight SCAC titles, winning by 18.5 points to claim the team title. TLU’s Julissa Rodriguez took the Athlete of the Meet honor, the second of her collegiate career, as she excelled in four field events and tallied 30 points. Rodriguez won the hammer throw with a distance of 44.35 meters, and added a second place finish in the javelin along with third place in the shot put and discus.
A season for the record books! TLU’s Clark sets NCAA D-III single-season stolen base record
Caelee Clark has been unstoppable on the basepaths this season. Once she reaches base, the TLU sophomore is likely to steal. Opposing catchers know this. But there’s very little they can do to stop it. Utilizing her tremendous speed, Clark set a new single-season NCAA D-III softball record on Saturday, raising her season total to 78 stolen bases as she swiped four bases in a 7-3 win over St. Thomas. What Clark has done this season is nothing short of incredible, and she has now officially etched her name into the NCAA all-time record book.
>> Clark has stolen the 7th-most bases in a single-season in NCAA softball history (all divisions). The all-time record of 96 was set by Shaw University's LaTosha Stevens (the current Division II single-season record) in 1992.
>> To get an idea of just how incredible this feat is, Clark has 78 stolen bases. Centenary’s Mackenzie Cox is No. 2 nationally in stolen bases in D-III softball this season…with 48 on the year. That’s a difference of 30 stolen bases, with Clark having played in seven fewer games than Cox. And there’s still the SCAC Tournament and NCAA Tournament on tap.
>> In addition to her success in stealing bases, the native of Montgomery, Texas is batting .495 on the year, good enough for the No. 1 mark in the SCAC and the 16th-best batting average in the country.
Numbers of the Week
894 was the final total for UT-Dallas women’s golf, who claimed its third ASC Championship title in the last four years on Monday. The Comets became the first team in ASC women’s golf championship history to record a score below 900 in a 54-hole tournament, breaking the previous record, also set by UTD (in 2023), of 914. The Comets secured an automatic bid to the NCAA Championship with the victory.
3,296 days between SCAC softball tournament appearances for Austin College, who finds itself back in playoff action for the first time since 2015. The ‘Roos have won 18 games this season, an 11-win jump from 2023, under second-year head coach Brandon Johnson. AC opens postseason action in Seguin on Friday at 1:30 p.m. against St. Thomas.
27 years at the helm of the Hardin-Simmons baseball program for head coach Steve Coleman, who announced his retirement this week. The longest-tenured coach at HSU, he came to Abilene in 1997, and will leave as the baseball program’s all-time wins leader, with a career record of 568-537. His coaching career is not over just yet, as Coleman will lead the Cowboys into the ASC Tournament on Thursday, facing UMHB at 11 a.m. in Marshall, Texas.
Said Coleman: "I came to Hardin-Simmons when I was 33 years old and this university has been so good to me," said Coleman. "I have grown as a coach, as a leader, as a husband, parent, grandparent, and strengthened my walk with the Lord. The coach in me always wished we would have won a title or more games, but the most important thing to me is the lasting relationships I have with my players and coaches. Those are the things I cherish the most."
D3 Texas in the National Rankings
Baseball
ETBU: #2 (D3Baseball.com Top 25)
Trinity: #9 (D3Baseball.com Top 25)
Softball
ETBU: #3 (NFCA Top 25)
Texas Lutheran: #12 (NFCA Top 25)
Men’s Track & Field
McMurry: #3 (USTFCCCA Track & Field Ratings Index)
ETBU: #15 (USTFCCCA Track & Field Ratings Index)
Hardin-Simmons: #19 (USTFCCCA Track & Field Ratings Index)
Women’s Tennis
Trinity: #15 (ITA DIII Top 50)
Southwestern: #47 (ITA DIII Top 50)
Men’s Tennis
Trinity: #10 (ITA DIII Top 50)
Southwestern: #39 (ITA DIII Top 50)
Concordia: #50 (ITA DIII Top 50)
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