2017 Ivy League Championship Series
PHILADELPHIA - The University of Pennsylvania baseball team plays for its first Ivy League title in 22 seasons - and sixth in program history - Tuesday in the three-game Ivy League Championship Series against Red Rolfe Division champion and host Yale. The winner of the best-of-three series earns the Ivy League's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament which is set to begin June 2.
PENN (23-20, 12-8 Ivy) at YALE (28-16, 16-4 Ivy)
Game 1: May 16 | 12:05 p.m. | Yale Field | Live Stats - ILDN Broadcast
Jake Cousins (7-1, 2.69 ERA) vs. Scott Politz (8-2, 4.10 ERA)
Game 2: May 16 | 3 p.m. (or 30 minutes after Game One) | Yale Field | Live Stats - ILDN Broadcast
Erik Brodkowitz (4-2, 4.91) vs. Adam Bleday (2-3, 3.75)
*Penn will be the designated home team
Game 3 (If Necessary): May 17 | 1:05 p.m. | Yale Field | Live Stats - ILDN Broadcast
Probable starters TBA
SCOUTING YALE
Overall: 28-16, 16-4 Ivy Streak: W4 Last ILCS Appearance: 2016 (Princeton won series, 2-1)
The Bulldogs return to their first Ivy League action in over two weeks after winning the Red Rolfe Division outright with three wins over Brown in the last weekend of April. Yale hosted UMass-Lowell in a tuneup game Wednesday, picking up a non-conference win in a 4-3 decision in New Haven. Like Penn, Yale also seeks its sixth Ivy League title this week and its first since 1994 when the Bulldogs clinched the series over the Quakers.
Yale has proven to be one of the top offensive powers in the Ivy this season, as a few key members of the lineup are among the league leaders in several statistical categories. Benny Wanger wrapped up his 2017 campaign tops in the Ivy League in RBIs with 35, while ranking third in home runs (5) and fourth in total bases (50). Wanger also paced the Yale lineup this season with a .365 average at the plate.
Tim DeGraw led the conference in runs with 24 while also ranking second in stolen bases, and Griffin Dey was tops in the Ivies with ten homers, contributing to Yale's team total of 34. Tuesday's scheduled game one starter, Scott Politz, currently ranks third in all of NCAA Division I with eight victories on the mound this season.
THE SERIES WITH YALE
The Quakers dropped both ends of the twinbill at Yale April 9, including a 5-4, ten-inning decision in the nightcap. Gabe Kleiman put Penn in position to earn at least a split with the Bulldogs after tossing six innings of one-run ball, but a late error allowed Yale to tie the game in the eighth before a walk-off double in the tenth sent the Quakers home with a 1-3 record in the Brown-Yale weekend. The Quakers' two losses on Sunday were the first of the season when leading after six innings and when scoring first.
PENN IN THE ILCS
Penn returns to the Ivy League Championship Series Tuesday for the first time since 2007 after clinching the Lou Gehrig Division title with a 6-3 win over Columbia May 7. The Quakers were swept by Brown in the best-of-three series that year in Providence, and are seeking the program's first championship series victory since 1995 when Penn cinched the Ivy League title with a 6-5 win over Yale.
The Quakers have claimed five Ivy League titles to date - 1975, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1995 - and attempt to snap a 22-season championship drought with two wins over the next two days. With two wins and a berth into the NCAA Tournament, Penn would attempt to win its first game in a regional since the 1990 season when the Quakers took down California-Santa Barbara in the West II Regional in Tempe, Ariz.
One and Not Done
Penn's May 7 win over Columbia in the one-game playoff for the Ivy League Gehrig Division was the first in the last five play-in games in program history, breaking a stretch of ten seasons that the Quakers have not appeared in the Ivy League Championship Series. Since the Ivy League divisional format was introduced prior to the 1993 season, there have been eight one-game playoffs to decide the champion of either the Gehrig or Rolfe divisions. Of those eight teams to advance to the ILCS, four have gone on to win the Ivy League title (Most recently: Columbia, 2015).
Penn On the Road
Despite a sub-500 mark in road contests this season, the Quakers have won five of their last seven away from home - with all seven coming against Ivy League opponents. Penn has belted 19 of its 31 home runs on the road this season, led by five from Matt O'Neill and four from Thomas Pellis.
Tops in the Ivy League
Reigning Ivy League Player of the Year Tim Graul lived up to all the expectations that come with such an honor, as the senior claimed the league's batting title with a .468 average in conference play this season. Graul also paced the Ivies in hits (36) while ranking second in slugging (.779) and on-base percentage (.517), third in doubles (9), and fourth in RBIs (20).
On the mound, Jake Cousins tied for the league lead in wins (4) and ranked third in conference ERA (3.09) while fellow staff member Gabe Kleiman finished fifth (3.21). Adam Bleday ran away with the strikeout lead with 42, while also posting an incredible 11.34 K/9 average in five Ivy starts.
Climbing the All-Time Ranks
Cousins secured his 20th career win in the Quakers' 6-3 win over Columbia May 7,
moving him into a tie for third on Penn's all-time wins list. Graul
currently ranks third all-time in program history with 41 doubles. Bleday's 73 strikeouts thus far in his senior season places him seventh on Penn's all-time single-season strikeout list. As a pitching staff, the Quakers' 340 strikeouts are a new all-time program record, and the team's 23 wins tie for the fifth-most in a single season.
Situationally Speaking
Penn is 18-4 this season when leading after six innings and holds a 14-6 record when scoring first. The Quakers are 17-9 when striking out less than six times at the plate, 19-8 when the starter pitches into the sixth inning and 21-12 when five or more starters in the lineup record a hit. Penn is 8-2 in Cousins' ten starts this season and 19-12 in games when leadoff man Chris Adams reaches base.
#FightOnPenn
