Senior duo gives stellar performance
Seniors Ryan Price and John Allman showed excellent play even though the Shockers defeated the Jayhawks 6-4
Price has beaten the school's homerun record.
By Tyler Passmore (Contact)
Wednesday, April 23rd, 2008
Two of the Jayhawks’ stars shined in Tuesday night’s instate battle at Wichita State, but that wasn’t enough. Even though both senior right fielder Ryne Price and senior left fielder John Allman excelled, the No. 14 team in the nation defeated the Kansas Jayhawks 6-4.
Price started his first two at bats with two hits and two stolen bases against the Shockers. Price’s average climbed to .335 and he increased his total of steals to seven on the year.
Photo by Jon Goering
Price repeated the excellent performance he showed when the Jayhawks first met the Shockers this season on April 1. Kansas lost 7-3, but Price was accountable for two of those runs when he scored his seventh homerun of the season.
Allman was the other Jayhawk who was on the attack from behind the plate. With the team’s best batting average at .358, Allman went 2-4 with a homerun and two RBIs.
“I was 2-0 and the guy has a good arm, so I was looking for a fastball,” Allman said. “I got a good pitch and tried to put a good swing on it and I got lucky.”
Allman has had an outstanding season from behind the plate this far and has been on par with his competition. When Kansas faced Nebraska, the No. 8 team of the country, last weekend, Allman had two hits in every game. Allman was 8-18, with four RBIs, a triple and a homerun, in the last four games, which were played against the No. 8 and No. 14 teams in the nation.
“It’s nice to see him back to putting the ball in play with two strikes,” coach Ritch Price said. “I still feel like he is chasing too many balls down out of the zone, but when he is hitting good pitches, he can really square the ball up as good as anyone in the nation.”
The Jayhawks two leading hitters combined to go 4-8 Tuesday night. On the year, Allman and Price have led the team in batting average with .358 and .335, respectively. While these feats are nice, Price has already captured the Kansas career home runs record with 33. The pair still has enough of the season left to do more damage to the Kansas record books and have been stepping it up against tough foes.
“I feel OK, we are not winning and I would rather go o’fer and us win,” Allman said. “I am really just trying to do what I can for the team to win.”
Kansas will ply host to Kansas Wesleyan tonight at 6 and will look to ignite some of the other bats in their lineup.
— Edited by Patrick De Oliveira
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