ST. LOUIS -- ESPN has notified the Missouri Valley Conference that two ESPNU telecasts featuring three league teams will be a part of its 2023 collegiate baseball programming schedule. 

Southern Illinois will play host to Evansville in an MVC contest on Sunday, April 16, that will be shown on ESPNU at 1 p.m. (CT) and Southern Illinois will travel to Indiana State on Sunday, April 23, as the Sycamores and Salukis will battle in a league game that will air on ESPNU at 2 p.m. (CT). 

The game between Evansville and Southern Illinois will be played at Itchy Jones Stadium in Carbondale, Illinois -- site of the Salukis’ home contests -- while the matchup between the Sycamores and the Salukis will take place at Bob Warn Field -- site of Indiana State’s home games and the 2023 MVC Tournament.  

The April 16 telecast will showcase defending 2022 regular-season champion Southern Illinois and an Evansville team that finished second in the title race a season ago. SIU won 44 games last season and secured the program’s first Valley regular-season title since 1990.   

The April 23 production will feature a Sycamore team that finished fifth in the MVC regular-season standings, facing Southern Illinois which has back-to-back 40 win seasons for the first time in program history.  

For the 27th time in 41 seasons, multiple MVC baseball teams were selected as part of the field of 64 teams to play for the 2022 College World Series title.   The 2022 season was the seventh time in the last eight seasons the MVC placed multiple teams into the NCAA field, including the fourth-straight year The Valley has finished the season as a Top 10 league nationally in RPI.