Winning on the road isn’t easy, and beating good teams on the road is even harder.

The Georgia Southern Eagles (24-9, 9-4 Southern Conference) took two out of three from Western Carolina over the weekend and split two with No. 8 Georgia Tech in the middle of the week, completing the season series at two apiece. Before pounding the Yellow Jackets 23-3 Wednesday, the Eagles dropped an 8-4 decision after a five-run, two-out Tech rally in the bottom of the fifth inning.

“I felt like we had a pretty good opportunity to win that game,” said GSU coach Rodney Hennon. “We bounced back Wednesday and played well to get a split there.”

The series win at Western sent the Eagles to second place in the SoCon standings.

The six-game road stretch ends today as Georgia Southern heads to North Florida for a 7 p.m. start. Andy Moye (3-0, 6.64 ERA, 34 strikeouts) will take the mound.

The Eagles return home for a rematch with Jacksonville (23-10) Wednesday at 6 p.m. at J.I. Clements Stadium. The Dolphins defeated GSU 8-7 earlier this season.

Although the Eagles came out of the difficult three-series stretch of Charleston, Tech and Western Carolina with a 6-2 record, Hennon knows his team must stay focused to keep the success going. Georgia Southern fell one spot to No. 27 in the Collegiate Baseball poll after the 3-2 week.

“We’ve got to continue to grind it out like we’ve done all year,” said the GSU coach. “It’s important we get better each week of the season. North Florida is traditionally a good ball club. Jacksonville is a team that’s playing awfully well right now, and Davidon’s a much-improved team. They’ve had some quality wins this year.”

Ty Wright (.378, 30 RBIs) has solidified himself as the Eagles’ leadoff man. He is working on a 16-game hitting streak. Catcher Griffin Benedict (.415, 33 RBIs) has a 12-game hitting streak and continues to lead the Eagles in offense.

Shortstop Brian Pierce has hit safely in the last 10 games.

Hennon feels that the one through five spots on the roster are going to remain roughly the same, but has been pleased with the versatility of the roster. The lineup has seen production out of Roman Grimaldi, Eric Phillips, Matt Miller, Jonathan King, Randy Williams and Kyle Blackburn, who have all taken advantage of their time in the lineup of late both in the field and at the plate.

“If you look at our team now as opposed to a few weeks ago, there are more guys that have been involved,” Hennon said. “We’ve got a couple of spots (in the lineup) that are certainly interchangeable.”

Notes: Along with the No. 27 ranking in the Collegiate Baseball poll, Georgia Southern is receiving Top 25 votes in the USA Today/ESPN Coaches Poll and the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Poll. ... Red hot Appalachian State has climbed to seventh in the Southern Conference after winning six straight and nine of their last 10. ... Charleston fell from second to fifth in the SoCon standings after back-to-back sweeps by GSU and Elon.



Matt Yogus can be reached at (912) 489-9404.