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SIU coach, Sikeston native Lance Rhodes enjoys return to SEMO
Thursday, March 25, 2021
Southern Illinois head coach Lance Rhodes, a Sikeston native, takes the ball from his pitcher on Wednesday at Capaha Field
Tony Capobianco ~ tcapobianco@semoball.com
Wednesday’s game between Southeast Missouri State and Southern Illinois felt like a homecoming for Saluki head coach Lance Rhodes.
Rhodes played high school baseball at Sikeston and started his college career at St. Louis before finishing at SEMO. He was on the coaching staff during the Redhawks’ best years in recent memory and experienced life in the SEC at Missouri before getting his first head coaching job.
“For me, it’s a special place because this is where I played, it’s where I coached,” Rhodes said. “So it brings back a lot of good memories when you come back to this place and seeing the hill (by the first base side of the field), seeing people up on the hill. There’s a lot of good memories seeing a bunch of people around the park.”
His homecoming couldn’t have gone any better as the Salukis pounded their way to a 21-4 victory. It was the highest scoring total in a single game during Rhodes’ tenure.
To put it in perspective, the Salukis scored more runs during this single game against the Redhawks than in their three-game series against Marshall this past weekend.
“The one word that we use a lot in our offense is ‘relentless,’” Rhodes said. “We want to be relentless from pitch to pitch, from at-bat to at-bat. We got guys that lock-in. They don’t give at-bats away and when you do that usually you can have a pitcher cave before a lineup does. It’s just not giving anything away and just pass it to the next guy.”
The Salukis led for the entirety of the game but it wasn’t until Nick Neville and Vinni Massaglia hit back-to-back home runs in a six-run second inning when Rhodes thought the scoring total was going to go through the roof.
“I thought it was going to be a higher scoring affair from both sides just with the way the wind was playing,” Rhodes said. “The strike zone was a little bit tighter at the beginning so it looked like it was going to turn into one of those midweek high scoring affairs from both sides. We got lucky there where we kind of broke it open in the early middle part of the innings there.”
Crazily, Tristan Peters drawing walks led to more runs scored for the Salukis than hitting the ball. The sophomore outfielder, who is batting .451 on the season, hit an RBI double in the fourth inning but he walked in the first inning with the bases loaded and another walk in the seventh inning led to Ian Walters scoring on a wild pitch.
“He’s been a good player since he stepped foot on campus,” Rhodes said of Peters. “He’s a guy that impacts the baseball really hard when he barrels it up and he finds the barrel a bunch.”
The game was well at hand for SIU going into the top of the ninth inning but the Salukis scored seven more runs in the final inning, highlighted by a grand slam by first baseman Phillip Archer.
As usual in mid-week games, both teams used their bullpens to get through the night. SIU used nine pitchers and SEMO ran with 10. Hunter Ralls started the game and was done before recording an out.
“Everybody in midweek games is kind of in the same boat where you’re using pitchers,” Rhodes said. “Whether it’s a midweek start or relievers for short stints, we’re all on the same boat.”
The Salukis finished above .500 twice in the past 10 seasons before Rhode’s arrival. SIU is currently ranked and sports an 18-1 record. Only two other teams in the Missouri Valley Conference are above .500 (both at 11-6), which means winning the conference and reaching the NCAA Tournament looks well within reach in Rhodes’ first full season as head coach.
“That’s the thing that we’ve been shooting for since we started in the fall, is to be a playoff contender,” Rhodes said. “There’s still a long way to go, a lot of season left, so by no means do we feel like we arrived.”
SIU returns home this weekend to face Little Rock. After licking their wounds, the Redhawks will travel north for a three-game series against Eastern Illinois.
