Freshman center fielder Dyllin Mucha would have liked to play against his older brother, Mikel, who plays for conference rival Wichita State University. 

But Mikel, a junior outfielder who was hitting .357, collided with senior outfielder Micah Green and fractured his fibula on Feb. 22.

“I wish I’d get to play against him, but he’s out right now because he’s hurt,” Dyllin said.

Dyllin has become a regular starter for the Salukis and has the third highest batting average on the team at .297.

Mikel said even though his brother plays for a rival team, he watches Dyllin’s stats closely, especially after his injury, and calls him after bad games to tell him to shake it off.

“He and his brother are very tight,” coach Ken Henderson said. “But he wants to be Dyllin Mucha, and he doesn’t want to be Mikel’s younger brother.”

“It would have been nice to go to Wichita,” Dyllin said. “It would have been cool to play with my brother, but when the Salukis contacted me I was definitely more interested in coming here.”

Dyllin said he hoped his family would cheer for the Salukis in a three-game series between the two schools this past weekend because Mikel is out for the rest of the season. Even though the Shockers were without him, they swept the Salukis.

“My mom was actually trying to decide how to (cheer),” Mikel said. “She actually made a half and half shirt and a half and half blanket.”

Dyllin’s roommate, freshman third baseman Ryan Sabo, said Dyllin often talks about how he wants to be better than Mikel.

“He’s always liked the whole rivalry situation by playing against each other rather than with each other,” Mikel Mucha said.

Mikel said the Shockers were one of the first Division I schools to contact him about playing.

The Mucha brothers are from Centennial, Colo. Henderson said the Saluki coaching staff frequently goes to Colorado to try to sign players. Dyllin attended the same high school as hitting coach Ryan Strain.

“My high school is probably one of the better high schools in the region,” Strain said. “Their team was very good when he went to my high school, so I had seen him play several times.”

The Salukis have five outfielders on the roster. Henderson said they would all get playing time and he didn’t expect Dyllin to be an everyday starter at this point of the season.

“We felt like we had to go out and get a guy capable of playing center field,” Henderson said. “He’s a guy we knew about early on and we stayed on him.”

Henderson said Dyllin needs to get more physical during his baseball career, but heard he has a good chance of eventually being more physical than Mikel.

“He’s the skinniest fat kid I’ve ever met in my life,” Sabo said. “When you look at him he’s skinny and when he takes his shirt off, he’s a fat kid.”

Wichita State was picked to win the Missouri Valley Conference in the preseason, and SIU was picked to finish fifth. The Shockers currently are in fifth place and the Salukis in eighth.

“It definitely brings out the intensity in the conference,” Mikel Said. “You always want to be better than your brother.”

Both schools will compete in the conference tournament May 20-24 in Terre Haute, Ind.