PHILADELPHIA – Originally scheduled for the traditional Saturday-Sunday format, the University of Pennsylvania baseball team will now host archrival Princeton Friday with a doubleheader beginning at 11:30 a.m. followed by a single game at noon on Saturday at Tommy Lasorda Field at Meiklejohn Stadium.
The Quakers and Tigers enter the weekend tied for second place (along with Cornell) in the Ivy League standings heading into the third conference weekend of the season.
GAME 23-25: Penn (10-12, 4-2 Ivy) vs. Princeton (7-19, 4-2 Ivy)
April 4-5 | Tommy Lasorda Field at Meiklejohn Stadium | Philadelphia, Pa.
Watch (ESPN+) | Live Stats –
Game 1,
Game 2,
Game 3 |
Program (PDF)
Another Ivy Weekend
At 4-2, both Penn and Princeton enter the first weekend of April looking to gain separation from the other Ivy programs with just four weekends remaining in the regular season after this series.
As it stands, the same four teams that qualified for the Ivy League Tournament a year ago sit in the same top four with Columbia, Cornell, Penn, and Princeton. The only difference is that the Quakers and Tigers are flipped from last season's seeding.
Princeton swept Dartmouth to open Ivy play, while Penn also swept Harvard to kick things off. The Tigers dropped two out of three games to Columbia while the Quakers couldn't finish off a series against Dartmouth in Hanover.
It's safe to say this upcoming series is important for both programs.
The Princeton Series
These programs have played a
ton of games against each other since the series began back in 1879. How fitting that they meet again in the 150th year of Penn Baseball?
Princeton leads the all-time set, 163-116-2 but the last 10 matchups have gone the way of the Quakers, 7-3.
Last year, Penn dropped two of three to Princeton on the road before eliminating the Tigers from the Ivy League Tournament, 9-4 in Little Falls, N.J., for the second year in a row.
The last time the two programs met in the regular season at Tommy Lasorda Field, the Quakers won the series two games to one and had a memorable pitching performance from
Ryan Dromboski.
In a 5-2 win for Penn in the rubber game on April 9, 2023, Dromboski set the program's single-game strikeout record by punching out 15 Tigers.
Spav On SportsCenter
Did you happen to catch SportsCenter late Tuesday night after Penn's 16-11 win over Lafayette earlier in the afternoon?
If you didn't, you missed seeing sophomore first baseman
Nick Spaventa earn the #SCTop10 No. 10 play of the day when he flipped over the Penn dugout railing and held on to the ball for the final out of the sixth.
It's the second play Spaventa has made in foul territory this season, both against the Leopards. In the series finale in Easton back on March 15, Spaventa diving backwards and securing the ball to end the game in eight innings due to darkness.
Lovingly known by his teammates and fans as "Spav," he's had a pretty darn good season at first this year, committing just two errors in 169 chances, making 159 putouts with eight assists for a fielding percentage of .988.
At The Plate
Well, there certainly was no shortage of runs for the Quakers at the plate on Tuesday in a 16-11 victory over Lafayette at Meiklejohn Stadium.
In fact, Penn put up an eight-spot in the fourth inning against the Leopards at home for the second straight year. In a 22-8 victory over Lafayette back on March 17, 2024, the Quakers drove in eight runs in two separate innings.
Penn has been fortunate to have three steady hitters step up to bat this season in .300-or-more batters
Jarrett Pokrovsky (.333),
Gavin Collins (.330), and
Ryan Taylor (.302).
Freshman
Ernie Echevarria has come on strong as of late, hitting .333 to begin his collegiate career. The Miami, Fla. native has collected three hits in two of his last three appearances.
Davis Baker (.263) hit his team-leading sixth home run of the season on Tuesday, also leading the Quakers in RBIs with 20 in 22 games. His .589 slugging percentage also leads the team while Collins has reached base at a .417 clip to finish first among qualified players.
On The Mound
Penn starting pitching struggled at Dartmouth last Friday when
Noah Millikan (0-2, 8.28 ERA) and
Sebastian Haggard (2-1, 3.86) both earned losses against the Big Green.
The Saturday (usually Sunday) starter, senior lefty
Will Tobin (1-1, 6.45) shoved in a neutral site affair in Hartford, Conn. when he tossed seven innings of two-hit ball with seven strikeouts. He held Dartmouth without a hit for the first five frames.
Josh Katz (2-2, 8.69) could see action out of the rotation this weekend, playing a big role out of the bullpen as of late. He appeared at Dartmouth last time out, throwing 4.1 innings without allowing an earned run (with one unearned run surrendered), striking out five and walking three.
Bullpen arms
Thomas Shurtleff (0-2, 0.77) and
John Cerwinski (1-1, 2.53)—who's battling back from an injury—have been consistently good all year long and have been recently joined by
Marty Coyne (1-1, 6.86),
Marshall Mott (1-0, 7.71),
Connor Darling (0-1, 9.00), and
Tommy Delany (1-1, 10.80).
Scouting The Tigers
Princeton enters the weekend with a 7-19 overall record, starting Ivy play at 4-2.
The Tigers most recently played on Wednesday afternoon at Seton Hall, falling 13-3, after dropping two out of three games to defending Ivy League regular-season champ Columbia at Clarke Field.
No Princeton hitter is batting north of .300 to begin the season but are led by Jake Koonin (.268) and Jake Bold (.247). The Tigers are hitting .197 as a team, the worst average in the Ivy.
Koonin has a team-high four homers while Nick Shenefelt has 14 RBIs to lead the way.
On the mound, Tiger pitching is allowing 7.51 runs per game while the staff has been led by Jacob Faulkner (1-1) and his 3.52 ERA. He has struck out 23 batters and walked just six in 30.2 innings. Justin Kim (2-1, 1.27) has been electric out of the bullpen in 21.1 innings pitched, while Sean Episcope (0-2, 3.15) has a team-best 26 strikeouts with just four walks.
Follow The Action
All three games this weekend will be streamed live on ESPN+ with Cory Nidoh on the play-by-play call. Live stats will be provided for all three games as well.
For the latest on Penn baseball, follow @PennBaseball on X (formerly Twitter), @Penn_Baseball on Instagram, and on the web at PennAthletics.com.
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