Key Rolfe Division Series at Yale This Weekend

The Games: Dartmouth (18-6, 6-2) at Yale (16-12, 4-4)
Locations: Yale Field (6,200), New Haven, Conn.
First pitch: Doubleheaders Saturday and Sunday, April 16-17 at noon
Series Record vs. Yale: Bulldogs lead, 114-85-1
Live Stats
Complete Game Notes

Divisional Play Begins
Having completed play against the Gehrig Division, Dartmouth gets its first taste of the teams in the Rolfe Division this weekend at Yale. The Big Green enter the four-game series with a two-game lead in the standings at 6-2, ahead of both the Bulldogs and Brown, each of whom split their eight games against the other division.

Last Week in Review
•    Dartmouth played five home games within the last week, winning each one to extend its win streak at Red Rolfe Field at Biondi Park to 16 games, the second longest in the country behind North Carolina, which has won 18 straight.
•    Most recently, the Big Green rallied from a 10-5 deficit with two in the seventh and an eight-run eighth to defeat Boston College on Tuesday, 15-10. The Eagles had won the last eight meetings, with the last Dartmouth victory coming in 2002.
•    The Dartmouth pitching staff surrendered just 10 runs over 38 innings to sweep doubleheaders from Cornell and Princeton. Both seven-inning contests instead went 10 with the Big Green rallying from behind in extra frames in each.
•    Senior outfielder Sam Bean hit safely in all five games last week and has the longest active hit streak in the Ivy League at a modest seven games.
•    Senior closer Ryan Smith earned two victories and a save over the weekend, and was chosen as the Ivy League Pitcher of the Week.

Last Time Against the Bulldogs
With a four-game sweep of Yale in Hanover, Dartmouth took command of the Rolfe Division and never looked back. Robert Young set the tone for the series by tossing a six-hit shutout in the first game, with Jason Brooks going 3-for-3 with two doubles, two runs and an RBI in the 3-0 win. A five-spot in the first inning — highlighted by a Jim Wren three-run homer — of game two allowed Dartmouth to cruise to a 7-4 triumph. Kyle Hendricks nearly duplicated Young's feat with 6.2 scoreless innings before the Bulldogs scored two meaningless runs in an 8-2 Green win. The final game was the closest as Dartmouth tied the score in the eighth at two on Joe Sclafani's run-scoring single, then won in the 10th when Chris O'Dowd singled home the winning run.

The Overall Record vs. Yale
•    The two teams have met exactly 200 times on the diamond with the Bulldogs having a decided advantage at 115-84-1.
•    With last year's series sweep of Yale — outscoring the Bulldogs 21-8 in the process — Dartmouth has won the last seven contests.
•    Dartmouth head coach Bob Whalen enters the series with a 41-37 mark versus the Bulldogs.
•    Yale has hosted the Big Green for 85 games since the steel and concrete structure was built in 1928, with Dartmouth going 30-54-1 in that time.
•    The first game in the series took place 130 years ago when the Big Green defeated Yale, 6-3.

Scouting Report on the Bulldogs
•    Yale has enjoyed a solid season to date, bridging March and April with a seven-game win streak, the last two victories starting Ivy play against Cornell.
•    The bats have produced a .288 average this season, but an even better .310 thus far in the eight Ivy games, both marks ranking second in the league.
•    Six Bulldogs are batting over .300 with part-timer Cam Squires leading the way at .367. But the most dangerous hitters have been Trey Rallis (.337/.426/.469) and Andy Megee (.316/.377/.447), the latter of which leads the team with nine doubles, 23 RBIs and 10 stolen bases. Rallis is hitting a league-best .462 in Ivy games.
•    The Yale pitching staff ranks in the middle of the pack in the Ivy League with a 5.19 ERA, but just 4.57 in conference play.
•    Left-hander Vinny Lally leads the conference with 53 strikeouts in 47.2 innings, but has also walked 26 batters.
•    Yale head coach John Stuper, a former major league pitcher, will rely mostly upon Cale Hanson, Kevin Fortunato and Eric Shultz out of the bullpen. Shultz has pitched in 16 games this season, more than any other Ivy pitcher.
•    Defensively, only the Bulldogs have a better fielding percentage than Dartmouth at .968 with 33 errors. Jacob Hunter and Gant Elmore make a strong double-play combination up the middle, but teams have run a bit on Yale with the opposition stealing 36-of-47 this year.

Probable Starting Pitchers
• Dartmouth will be sticking to its weekend rotation, beginning with sophomore LHP Kyle Hunter (3-1, 2.12). The southpaw is 5-1 in his career over 14 starts, but has not gotten a decision in six of his seven regular-season Ivy starts, including last week despite allowing just one run over nine innings while striking out a career-high 10 batters. Junior RHP Cole Sulser (3-0, 2.41) will climb the hill for game two on Saturday. He is coming off a complete-game victory in which he struck out a career-best 13 hitters while winning his 11th straight decision. On Sunday, junior RHP Kyle Hendricks (2-2, 2.12) gets the call. Like Hunter, he did not get a decision last week in a 10-inning win over Princeton, tossing eight innings and yielding three runs. Closing out the series will be freshman LHP Mitch Horacek (3-0, 7.30), who had his best start of the season in beating Princeton last week as he surrendered just one run over six innings with five strikeouts.
• In the first 24 games this year, Dartmouth has faced just two left-handed starters. Yale will change all that by sending three southpaws to the mound. First up will be LHP Vinny Lally (3-0, 2.45) who did not allow a run last week to Penn over nine innings, but could not get a win as Yale was shut out in a 10-inning loss. The lone right-hander, Pat Ludwig (2-2, 3.94), will take to the mound for game two. He has won both of his conference starts, giving up just two earned runs in 11 innings. LHP Christopher O'Hare (3-0, 3.63) goes first on Sunday; he has walked just three batters in 17.1 innings. Finally, LHP Brook Hart (3-3, 2.75) goes in game four. He got off to a great start, but is 0-2 with a 6.23 ERA in his two Ivy starts.

What's Up Next
Dartmouth begins an eight-game homestand on Tuesday when it hosts Saint Anselm at 3:30 p.m. before playing Hartford the next day at 3 p.m. The Brown Bears come to Hanover next weekend for noon doubleheaders on both Saturday and Sunday.

Ivy Pitcher of the Week
Senior Ryan Smith, the all-time saves leader at Dartmouth and in the Ivy League, somehow had never before earned the conference's Pitcher of the Week honor previously, but he could not be overlooked after winning two games and saving another during an Ivy weekend on April 9-10. Against Cornell, he pitched the 10th inning before the Green rallied for the win in the bottom half. The next day, he doubled as a masterful escape artist to get the win versus Princeton in the first game, entering in the 10th with runners on the corners and nobody out in a tie game, yet keeping the Tigers off the board to allow Dartmouth to score the game-winning in the bottom half. Smith recorded the final two outs of a 5-2 victory over Princeton to cap his weekend and wrap up the award.

8-Run 8th Keeps Home Streak Alive
Trailing 10-5 into the bottom of the seventh against Boston College on April 12, it looked as if the Big Green's home winning streak would come to an end. But Dartmouth chipped away with two in the seventh before exploding for eight runs in the fateful eighth frame. Junior Joe Sclafani finished what he started, hitting a one-out double to begin the rally before capping it with a two-run triple. The win extended the home winning streak to 16 games, second only to North Carolina (18), and the second longest in school history. From 1923-26, Dartmouth won 32 straight games in Hanover.

Offense Among Nation's Best
At the end of last weekend, Dartmouth continued to be ranked among the top 15 in five offensive statistical categories — triples per game (0.61, 2nd), doubles per game (2.43, 7th), scoring (8.2, 7th), batting average (.320, 11th) and slugging percentage (.473, 13th). Junior Joe Sclafani was fifth with 1.3 runs scored per game (then scored twice against BC) and 11th with 0.17 triples per game (and clubbed another versus BC). Those numbers only improved after beating Quinnipiac 16-8, but national stats are released just once a week.

Gab on the Green
•    The 15-10 win over BC was the first Dartmouth win over the Eagles since 2002. Boston College had won the previous eight encounters.
•    Senior catcher Brandon Parks hit his first career home run against BC, hitting a blast off the roof of Leverone Field House down the right-field line.
•    Junior Joe Sclafani is quickly moving up the Dartmouth career charts. He hit his 13th career triple in the win over BC, putting him fourth on the all-time list. And he also scored two more runs giving him 117 to date, seventh at Dartmouth with about one and a half seasons to go.
•    Finding his stroke at the plate recently has been junior David Turnbull, who is hitting .417 (10-for-24) over the last six games with three doubles.
•    Both sophomore Kyle Hunter and junior Cole Sulser posted personal-best marks in innings and strikeouts against Cornell on April 9. Hunter did not get a decision despite allowing just one run over nine innings and striking out 10. Sulser upstaged the southpaw in the second game with a nine-inning, complete-game victory with 13 strikeouts.
•    A big reason why sophomore Ennis Coble is leading the Ivy League in RBIs is because he is hitting .511 (24-for-47) with runners on base and .600 (21-for-35) with runners in scoring position.
•    Freshman Mitch Horacek has started an inning on the mound 25 times, and the opposition has put the lead-off hitter on base just three times.
•    Horacek's classmate, Mike Dodakian, has been particularly effective with runners on base, holding opponents to a .194 average (6-for-31).
•    Senior Jeff Onstott ranks among Dartmouth's top 10 all-time in triples (10, 7th), walks (74, 7th) and hits (174, 8th), plus is on the verge of moving into the top 10 in runs (111, 11th), games played (150, 11th) and RBIs (105, 12th).
•    Senior Sam Bean stole three bases in the 14-10 loss at Penn, after having swiped just one in his entire career. The last Big Green base runner to nab three bags in one game was Damon Wright '08 against Navy in the third game of 2008.
•    The first, third and eighth innings have been especially good to the Big Green bats this year. Dartmouth has scored at least 36 runs in each of those frames, including 46 in the third, with a combined .403 batting average.

Winning Program
With the five home wins this past week, Dartmouth has nudged its all-time record (dating back to its first year of baseball in 1866) to 1,776-1,773-24. The last time the Big Green began a day above .500 came more than 20 years ago on March 20, 1991.

Winning Coach
Not only is the Big Green baseball program back in the black, so is head coach Bob Whalen. The victory over Boston College boosted his career record to 421-420-1, the first time it had been better than even since March 18, 1991, when he was sitting at 23-22.

Schedules