THE LATEST LINE: SE BASEBALL TEAM HAS A SPECIAL LOOK

After all the excitement Southeast Missouri State University's basketball team generated this season, now plenty of Indian fans are turning their attention to the baseball diamond and with good reason.

While the bulk of the season still lies ahead, the SEMO baseball squad has given every indication that this could be a special year.

Entering their weekend non-league series at Belmont, the Indians had won 17 of their first 22 games, which includes victories in four of their first five Ohio Valley Conference contests.

That OVC record looks even better when you consider that SEMO's first two conference series were on the road against squads picked to contend for upper-division league finishes.

So far this year, coach Mark Hogan's squad has been extremely proficient in the three major categories of offense, defense and pitching. The Indians lead the OVC in earned-run average and fielding percentage while ranking second in batting average.

And the Indians' 17-5 overall record prior to the weekend -- by far the best in the OVC -- was certainly not built on a schedule of patsies.

SEMO has beaten Arkansas and Missouri once each and owns a pair of wins over both Southwest Missouri and Memphis. Four of the Indians' losses were against perennial powerhouses Arkansas and Mississippi.

An average of more than 500 fans have turned out at Capaha Field for SEMO's home games so far this season and that total figures to only go up when the Indians see their first OVC home action next weekend against preseason league favorite Middle Tennessee.

* SEMO will host its annual All Sport Invitational Saturday at the Abe Stuber Track & Field Complex.

Coach Joey Haines said the field has been increased this year to as many as 12 or 13 teams and the event should be extremely competitive.

* Former Cape Central High School swimming standouts Erin Vogt and Jon Younghouse will compete in the 2000 United States Olympic Trials Aug. 9-13 in Indianapolis.

Vogt, a sophomore at the University of Arizona who has been a multi-event All-America during her first two collegiate seasons, will compete in the Olympic Trials in four events.

Younghouse, a senior, eight-event All-America at Texas who helped lead the Longhorns to the NCAA title last weekend, will swim in three events at the Olympic Trials.

* The local college basketball season is over, but a lot of people are already thinking ahead to next year.

And along those lines, plenty of SEMO fans have been inquiring about whether Murray State's two super seniors, Aubrey Reese and Isaac Spencer, who both entered college as Proposition 48 students, will be eligible for a final season of eligibility.

I checked with Murray State officials and they told me that Reese, as a non-qualifier out of high school, is done with his college career.

But Spencer, although he was also a non-qualifier out of high school, is potentially eligible for one more season because of a learning disability that was discovered after he got to college.

In order to qualify for a final season, Spencer must continue to make solid progression toward his degree throughout the rest of the school year.

~Marty Mishow is a sports writer for the Southeast Missourian