Former ENMU Baseball Player Stephen Marquez Dies in Auto Accident in Wyoming
Set Home Run Record for Greyhounds in 1995 and 1996

PORTALES, N.M. — Former Eastern New Mexico University baseball player Stephen Marquez died in an automobile accident in Wyoming on Friday, Feb. 3, 2006. Services for Marquez are scheduled to be held in Alamogordo, N.M., this week.

Marquez, who played shortstop at 6’2”, 220 pounds, competed for the Greyhounds in 1995 and 1996, following two seasons at Lamar Community College in Colorado. He established Eastern’s single season home run record with 12 homers in 1995. He matched his own record with another 12 home runs in 1996. He continues to hold the single season record and is the Greyhounds’ career home run leader with 24. Other records he still holds are RBIs in a game (7), RBIs in a season (58), sacrifice flies in a season (6) and assists in a game (8).

While playing at ENMU, Marquez helped form a highly-successful middle infield with second baseman Steve Heredia. The pair contributed many of team’s double plays in 1996, when Eastern led all of NCAA Division II and set an ENMU record with 70 double plays for the season. Marquez hit .366 with 58 RBIs in 1995 and batted .339 with 56 RBIs in 1996.

“He was one of the most feared hitters in the Lone Star Conference in those days,” ENMU Head Coach Phil Clabaugh said. “In many ways, he was the one player who turned us from an average team into a team that could challenge for the conference title (ENMU took second in the LSC in 1996). In my 20 years of coaching, when I make my list of the top nine hitters I’ve ever coaches, he’s certainly one of them.”

The schedule of services for Marquez will begin on Thursday, Feb. 9, with a viewing at Sears Mortuary in Alamogordo from 3 p.m. until 5 p.m. MST. A rosary will be held Thursday evening, starting at 7 p.m. MST at the Immaculate Conception Church. Mass in his honor will be held at 10 a.m. MST on Friday, Feb. 10, also at the Immaculate Conception Church.

Marquez was a native of Alamogordo. He was working for the Air Force and was stationed in Wyoming at the time of his death.