Baseball set to begin season

ULM opens its 2020 baseball campaign on Friday against Southeast Missouri State at 6 p.m. at home.

The Warhawks will play three games over the weekend against the Redhawks. With the following two games on Saturday and Sunday at 3 and 1 p.m., respectively.

The Warhawks will open with 11 of their first 13 games at Warhawk Field where they were successful last year, going 13-13.

In his third season as head coach Michael Federico will look to improve on a nearly .500 campaign as ULM went 27-31.

The Warhawks ended the year on a high note as they returned to the Sun Belt Conference Tournament for the first time in three seasons.

The team shocked the rest of the Sun Belt getting all the way to the quarterfinal before falling to Coastal Carolina.

ULM will look to improve upon last season’s performance as they finished near the bottom of the Sun Belt conference before making their surprising run.

The Warhawks are led by preseason All-Sun Belt member Andrew Beesley, who is coming off a successful campaign that saw him start every game while batting .329, adding 38 runs scored and 37 RBIs to his successful year.

ULM will look for him and fellow returner Ryan Humeniuk to lead an offense that averaged over six runs a game.

On the schedule this year is Ole Miss who comes to Warhawk Field on March 10 and 11 to play ULM.

ULM will also face I-20 rivals Grambling State and Louisiana Tech five times.

Athletic department in the red

According to the Louisiana Legislative Auditor, ULM reported total athletic revenues of $15,568,952 while its expenses amounted to $16,927,856 totaling in a deficit of $1,358,904 from July 1, 2018 to June 30, 2019.

The shortfall is due in part to being without an official athletic director for part of the fiscal year. The athletic department also went six months without an assistant athletic director for external operations after Steven Farmer left in December 2018. His replacement, Lee Denny, was not officially hired as the assistant AD for fundraising and development in Aug. 2019, two months into the 2020 fiscal year.

Another reason is that the teams on campus lost money as well. The football program’s total operating revenues were $3,442,442 while it expended $5,814,314, a loss of $2,371,872.

The largest reported deficit came from “other sports” as the university made $642,775 while spending $5,233,866 for a $4,591,091 difference.

The athletic program has attempted to help the deficit with programs like softball now charging admission to games to help raise more money.

This is the second straight fiscal year that ULM’s athletic department finished in the red, reporting a $396,00 loss for 2018.

Also for the second straight year, contributions to the athletic department  decreased from $844,010 to $623,918.

Football announces recruiting class

ULM football announced four more committed recruits for the class of 2020.

The four new recruits were announced after National Signing Day, the four are linebackers Javarian Jenkins and Ja’Korian Newsome, safety Tre Odom and tight end Noah Patty.

The four new additions brought the class to a total of 22 new players. As of 247Sports, one of the premiere recruiting databases ranked ULM at the bottom of the Sun Belt in terms of recruiting even though they had the third largest class.

The class is heavy on defense as the two linebackers join other linebacker Taylor Behl. Similarly, Odom joins fellow safeties Zac Gulley and Keydrain Calligan. The program also added one defensive end, two interior defensive linemen and one cornerback.

Offensively the Warhawks have added three offensive linemen, three quarterbacks, three wide receivers and one tight end.

As of 247Sports the Warhawks had no player higher than a three star commit to the university but had 18 three stars and four two stars.

The class ranked 120th in the nation, just after the University of Nevada and just before Fresno State. In-state rival University of Louisiana Lafayette had the highest class in the Sun Belt, finishing 78th.