Step right up! Get your Furman season tickets!

Or, more likely, make a call (864-294-3099) or get on the web (FurmanPaladins.com).

Season tickets start at $155 and include all six regular season games.  Bleacher seats, bench seats and purple chair back seats on the west (home) side of Paladin Stadium are available.

 Furman kicks off the 2025 season at home on Aug. 30 when it plays host to William & Mary, followed by a Sept. 6 matchup versus Presbyterian.  The Paladins open their four-game Southern Conference schedule on Oct. 4 against East Tennessee State and will also welcome longtime rival The Citadel (Oct. 25), 2024 SoCon champion Mercer (Nov. 1), and VMI (Nov. 15) to Greenville.

 Furman is coached by Clay Hendrix ‘86, who will be entering his ninth season at the helm of the Paladin program.

Furman won a Southern Conference softball series in Johnson City by winning the latter game of a Saturday doubleheader, 7-1, over East Tennessee State.

After Furman claimed a 6-4 victory on Friday night, the Bucs evened the series with a 1-0 decision in the opening game of the twinbill.

Marissa Barnes hurled a two-hit shutout to power ETSU to a 1-0 victory in game one. The righthander needed just 82 pitches to get through seven innings and improve to 3-3 in the circle. Barnes issued four walks and recorded four strikeouts in the victory.

Emme Buzhardt (5-7) was the tough-luck loser for Furman. She surrendered only an unearned run on five hits over six innings while fanning three batters without allowing a walk.

Freshmen Rachel Hawkins and Madison Petty registered the only hits for the Paladins.

Furman scoreded four runs in the top of the sixth inning and three more in the seventh to claim the series victory with a 7-1 triumph in game two.

Furman broke open a scoreless tie with four runs in the top half of the sixth against ETSU starter Eden Muncy. Kate Stoltzfus worked a leadoff walk and Caitlin Goldwait followed with a bunt single. After a pop out, Sylvia Burroughs loaded the bases with a walk and Kiley Perry gave the Paladins the lead with a sacrifice fly. Hawkins then lined a two-run double to left field to up the lead to 3-0 before Katie Peeler bounced an RBI single up the middle to drive in the fourth run of the frame.

Muncy absorbed the loss for ETSU (13-22, 2-4 SoCon) after allowing four runs on five hits in six innings. She walked two Paladins and recorded five strikeouts. 

The Paladins (13-22, 3-3 SoCon) are back at home next weekend to host SoCon rival UNC Greensboro in a three-game series at Pepsi Stadium. Both Saturday’s doubleheader and Sunday’s finales are set for 1 p.m.

Two runs in the top of the seventh gave Furman a 6-4 in the series opener on Friday.

Senior Emme Buzhardt, who entered the game in relief in the sixth inning, worked around a two-out single to retire the Bucs in the bottom of the seventh.

Furman lacrosse opened Big South Conference play Wednesday evening with a 15-5 victory over the Gardner-Webb Runnin’ Bulldogs at Paladin Stadium.
Furman improves to 7-2 overall and 1-0 in the Big South. With the loss, Gardner-Webb drops to 0-9 on the season and 0-1 in league play.
Paige Harman, who also became the ninth player in program history to reach 100 career goals, guided the Paladin offense with career highs of eight points and five goals while adding three assists.

Furman outscored Gardner-Webb 10-1 in the second half and scored seven times in the fourth quarter.

Senior Matthew Smith finished 15th in the 5,000 meters to lead the Furman track and field teams Thursday in the opening day of the Raleigh Relays at the Paul Derr Track & Field Facility on the campus of N.C. State.

Smith, a native of Leesburg, Va., recorded a personal-best time of 3:40.54, which is the 13th-best qualifying time for the NCAA East Preliminaries at this point in the season. 

Junior Carly Wilkes won the 10,000 and established a new Furman program record to lead the Paladin track and field teamto conclude the Raleigh Relays on Saturday. 

Wilkes, a native of Salem, Va., recorded a time of 33:20.08 to take gold in the 10K, breaking the former Furman record of 33:35.11, set by Savannah Carnahan at the Raleigh Relays in 2019.Furman will compete at the Duke Invitational in Durham, N.C., and at the Asheville Bulldog Invite April 10-12.

Harris Barth is Southern Conference Men’s Golfer of the Week.

Barth, who also won the honor alongside teammate Clark Akers on Oct. 23, tied for fifth at the Hootie at Bulls Bay in Awendaw, which wrapped play on Tuesday.  A junior from Atlanta, Ga., he posted rounds of 69-69-68 for a tournament score of 206 (-10).

Furman placed third as a team in the 15-team, 84-golfer field with a three-round total of 837. 

Sara Snyder is the SoCon women’s tennis player of the week.

Snyder won the No. 1 singles match up against Darya Schwartzman, 3-6, 6-3, 6-1, in Furman’s 4-2 defeat of Rice on Sunday, March 23.

This is the fourth Player of the Week win for Snyder, also honored on Jan. 21, Feb. 25, and March 18. 

Women’s basketball standouts Tate Walters and Kate Johnson College Sports Communicators (CSC) Division I Academic All-District.

The team recognizes the nation’s top student-athletes for their combined performances on the court and in the classroom.

Walters sports a 3.58 GPA and earned her undergraduate degree in communications from Furman in the spring of 2023 and will soon be accorded a master’s degree in strategic design.

Johnson, a business administration major, sports a 3.56 grade point average.

Junior Ben Vander Wal is Academic All-District from the men’s team.

Vander Wal, a native of Elmhurst, Ill., averaged 5.7 points and a team-leading 5.5 rebounds while appearing in 34 games and making 30 starts for the Paladins. He shot .542 from the field and added 70 assists, 24 steals, and 14 blocked shots to help the Paladins to a 25-9 record and NIT bid.

 A communication studies major, VanderWal sports a 4.0 GPA.
No. 38 Furman blanked Brown, 4-0, last Monday at Mickel Tennis Center

With the victory, the Paladins extended their women’s tennis winning streak to eight matches, while Brown dropped to 8-6.

The streak ended on Friday when the Paladins dropped a 4-1 decision on Friday.
The Paladins fall to 13-3 on the season while Charlotte improves to 16-3 overall. 

Furman won the bottom two doubles matches to claim the doubles point. Jess Dawson and Macy Hitchcock won 6-1 over Prisca Abbas and Lucia Aranda at flight two before Amira Badawi and Sarah Suchankova evened things at flight one with a 6-2 win against Ellie Schulson and Sara Snyder. In the flight three contest, Alexa Griffith and Marissa Pennings closed things out with a 6-4 victory against Shona Nakano and Ni Xi to clinch the point.

 The 49ers swept all four completed singles matches to claim the 4-1 victory.
The Paladins were leading in the two unfinished matches at flights three and six.

Men’s tennis concluded the non-conference portion of its schedule Saturday afternoon with a 7-0 victory over Emmanuel (Ga.) at Mickel Tennis Center.
Furman improves to 6-11 overall while Emmanuel (Ga.) drops to 5-9 on the season.
The Paladins swept their way through the doubles portion of the match, winning all three contests by 6-1 scores. Playing together for the first time this season, Sam Fancutt and Matt Kandel topped Murilo Gracio and Eben Gunyon at No. 3, and Cole Burman and Connor Laymon clinched the point for Furman at No. 1 with their fifth win of the season over James Girdler and Aleksander Simovski. In the No. 2 match, Nicolas Dispas and Nico Snyder registered their team leading 10th victory this year against Henrique Castro and Marcos Llorens.

The Paladins followed in singles play by winning all six matches, each in straight sets, to complete the sweep.

An old sitcom of my youth, Petticoat Junction, had a theme song that included, “That’s Uncle Joe, he’s a-moving kinda slow, at the Junction.”

As I make my appearances at local baseball games, I can relate.

But I’m walking, getting better all the time, but as with my gait, slowly.

My books, most fiction, are available on Amazon and at other online bookseller sites.

Cowboys Come Home is about two Texans who return home from World War II hoping in vain for their lives to return to normal.

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell is a tale of political conspiracy and corruption set in the present.

The Latter Days is about an aging scout who discovers a baseball prospect he takes under his wing.