With one of the biggest days in the history of sports on Saturday, add the Alabama State baseball series at Jackson State to the mix as the teams play this weekend in Jackson for the SWAC's Eastern Division title.
 
The Hornets (28-14 overall, 16-5 SWAC) and Tigers (28-18, 14-7) will play Saturday in a 1 p.m. doubleheader and a Sunday 1 p.m. single game, with live radio broadcast on bamastatesports.com beginning with the pregame show at 12:45 p.m. at Braddy Field. Jackson State will also provide a free live video stream of Saturday's games, with all of the links available on gameday central on bamastatesports.com.
 
The mega fight between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao, the Kentucky Derby (first leg of horse racing's Triple Crown), the NBA playoffs, the NHL playoffs, Yankees-Red Sox baseball and the NFL Draft are all scheduled to be held on the new month's first Saturday. It's appropriate the best baseball rivalry in the Southwestern Athletic Conference is on the docket as Alabama State and Jackson State meet for the second series of the season.
 
The Hornets won two of three games at home over J-State on March 28-29, as each team has won 11 times in the past 22 head-to-head matchups since 2012. With the teams projected to be the first and third divisional seeds in the SWAC Baseball Tournament May 13-17 in New Orleans, there is likely at least one more meeting between the programs later this month.
 
However, first things first as the SWAC's two winningest programs over the past four years (Jackson State 128 wins, Alabama State 117 wins) meet again. The Hornets lost two of three last week against second-place Alabama A&M in Birmingham, as the Bulldogs have completed league play with a 16-8 SWAC mark. Jackson State won three of four last weekend at Mississippi Valley State before losing at home Tuesday to the University of New Orleans.
 
"We have five games left in the regular season and we will use these games as the final preparation for the conference tournament," said Alabama State head coach Mervyl Melendez, whose team will play UAB in back-to-back games Tuesday and Wednesday. "Every conference series is important and we will approach this one with that same mindset."
 
This weekend not only features the best baseball programs in the conference, but the top hitting teams in the league. Alabama State leads the SWAC in batting average at .314, just ahead of Jackson State's .310 average. Cesar Rivera's .402 average ranks second in the conference to Jackson State's Melvin Rodriguez' .448.The twosome is also 1-2 in runs scored  in the league, as Rivera's 51 runs scored is second to Rodriguez' 53.
 

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