2015 Baseball Season Opens at Texas A&M on ESPN3

2/26/2015 7:56:00 PM | Baseball

By: Dartmouth

Season Opener
• Dartmouth begins its 143rd season of varsity baseball with a three-game series at 14th-ranked Texas A&M with every game being shown live on ESPN3. The only other time these two teams met came at the 2010 NCAA Regional at which the Aggies eliminated the Big Green thanks to solo homers in the eighth and ninth innings in a 4-3 final.

Dartmouth (0-0) at
#14 Texas A&M (9-0)
Olsen Field at Blue Bell Park
College Station, Texas

Friday, Feb. 27, 7:35 p.m. (EST)
Video: SEC Network + / ESPN3 • Live Stats
RHP Duncan Robinson (7-3, 2.96 in 2014) vs. LHP A.J. Minter (2-0, 0.00)

Saturday, Feb. 28, 3:05 p.m. (EST)
Video: SEC Network + / ESPN3 • Live Stats
RHP Louis Concato (1-2, 3.60 in 2014) vs. RHP Grayson Long (1-0, 4.66)

Sunday, Mar. 1, 1:05 p.m. (EST)
Video: SEC Network + / ESPN3 • Live Stats
LHP Adam Frank (7-3, 5.56 in career) vs. LHP Matt Kent (2-0, 1.32)

•   Head coach Bob Whalen enters his 26th season with an overall record of 507-474-1, including last year's 18-21 mark (first time under .570 in seven years). In 2010, he surpassed former big league pitcher Jeff Tesreau as the Big Green's all-time winningest coach. Tesreau coached Dartmouth for 28 seasons (1919-46).
•   Dartmouth is 12-13 in the first game of the season under Whalen, having lost to No. 30 FIU last year, 11-0, before returning the favor with a shutout of its own in the second game, 3-0.
•   Last year the Big Green won their seventh straight Rolfe Division title after defeating Yale in a one-game playoff. But in the best-of-three Ivy League Championship Series, Dartmouth fell to Columbia held at the Lions' Satow Stadium, keeping the Green from winning their third Ivy title in the past six seasons.
•   Dartmouth won a school-record 32 victories in 2013, giving the Ivy League a 30-win team for a three consecutive years; Cornell won 31 in 2012 and Dartmouth had an even 30 in 2011. The streak was broken last year with Columbia coming closest with 29. Before that, no Ivy team had reached 30 since Harvard in 1998, and the feat has been acomplished just nine times ever.
•   The Big Green had eight players earn All-Ivy recognition, led by RHP Duncan Robinson and 1B Dustin Selzer on the first team.
•   Not only does Dartmouth have to replace Selzer, but also RF Jeff Keller who was named an Academic All-American for a second straight year.
•   Prior to last year, Dartmouth had at least one player drafted in nine of the previous 10 seasons, including three in 2008 and 2013. But the Big Green did have an alumnus make an MLB debut for a second straight year as Kyle Hendricks '12 posted a 7-2 record and 2.46 ERA for the Chicago Cubs in 13 starts. Ed Lucas '04 played for the Miami Marlins the past two years and signed with the Texas Rangers in the off-season.
•   While this won't come into play for a month as Dartmouth plays its first 22 games on the road, the Big Green have an .835 winning percentage (76-15) at Red Rolfe Field at Biondi Park since the facility was renovated prior to the 2009 season.

The Overall Record vs. Texas A&M
•   Dartmouth has squared off against the Aggies just once, a 4-3 Texas A&M win in an elimination game at the 2010 NCAA Regionals.
•   Dartmouth held a 3-2 lead through seven innings on the strength of freshman Kyle Hunter, who allowed just one earned run over 6.1 stanzas. But Joe Patterson hit a two-out solo homer in the eighth and Kevin Gonzalez led off the ninth with another solo blast to keep the Aggies alive at the Miami Regional.

Scouting the Aggies
•   Ranked in every poll except Baseball America, Texas A&M has won its first nine games with three-game sweeps of Holy Cross and Penn State, as well as solitary victories over Stephen F. Austin, Houston Baptist and Incarnate Word.
•   The Aggies are hitting a robust .351 as a team, led by Mitchell Nau with a ridiculous .560 average and .639 on-base percentage. They have also shown plenty of power with 13 homers as Logan Taylor and Ronnie Gideon have three apiece.
•   The pitching staff sports a 1.67 ERA through nine games, and 10 of the 13 pitchers that have climbed the mound have an ERA under 2.00.

Probable Starting Pitchers
•   The honor of starting opening day goes to junior RHP Duncan Robinson (7-3, 2.96 in 2014) who made just three starts a year ago but was an All-Ivy first-teamer as a reliever while leading the team in innings in 2014. On Saturday, senior RHP Louis Concato (1-2, 3.60) will toe the slab in his fifth season, followed by senior LHP Adam Frank (0-2, 13.97) on Sunday. Frank showed the form that brought him All-Ivy honorable mention as a freshman during preseason camp.
•   Texas A&M will counter with LHP A.J. Minter (2-0, 0.00) who has allowed just two unearned runs while striking out 16 in 10 innings, RHP Grayson Long (1-0, 4.66) for game two and LHP Matt Kent (2-0, 1.32) with his team-high 13.2 innings in the finale.

What's Up Next
Dartmouth will get on a plane next weekend and head for the Sunshine State to play last year's College World Series participant Indiana, another Big 10 team in Northwestern, Ball State and Bucknell in the Snowbird Classic in Port Charlotte, Fla.

Going for 8th Straight Rolfe Title
Dartmouth has won seven straight Rolfe Division titles, the second longest streak for any team in either division in the Ivy League since divisions were instituted 22 years ago. Princeton won nine straight Gehrig Division crowns from 1996-2004 and has 11 total in the 22 seasons. The Big Green have the most Rolfe titles with 10, all of which have come in the last 15 years.

D1Baseball.com Picks Big Green
While the consensus from the various college baseball media outlets is that Dartmouth will win its eighth straight division title, the only outlet to pick the Big Green to win the Ivy League title was D1Baseball.com. The last time Dartmouth took the crown was in 2010 with its last postseason game coming against Texas A&M.

Preseason Rookie of the Year
The Ivy League Rookie of the Year has been named every year since 1993, and a Dartmouth player has been the recipient of the honor seven times, which leads the league. During its preseason look at the Ancient Eight, Perfect Game predicted that number to increase with the addition of Kyle Holbrook to the roster, an outfielder/catcher from Broomfield, Colorado. An all-region player as a junior and senior at Broomfield, Holbrook hit a robust .516 with 14 extra-base hits, including two homers, in his final prep season.

Other Preseason Honors
Dartmouth is the consensus pick to win the Rolfe Division in the Ivy League for an eighth consecutive year. Only CollegeSportsMadness.com provided preseason all-conference teams during the preseason, with four Big Green players being selected for the second team: third baseman Nick Lombardi, shortstop Matt Parisi, right-hander Duncan Robinson and outfielder Nick Ruppert.

Big Green Are Road Warriors …
As is custom for Dartmouth, it will begin the season on the road all of the way into April. The first 22 games are scheduled to be played away from Hanover, and the home schedule doesn't begin until April 4 with a doubleheader against Cornell, beginning the second weekend of Ivy play.

… But Love the Homestead
Dartmouth enters the 2015 season with a 76-15 record (.835) at its home venue, Red Rolfe Field at Biondi Park, one of the best home records over the past six seasons. Last year the Big Green went 9-5 in the games they hosted, getting off to a slow start before taking eight of their last nine. Dartmouth enters this year with a modest five-game home winning streak, tied for 20th longest in the country entering the weekend.

Doing Without
Every team has to deal with injuries, and Dartmouth is no different as three key members of last year's team will miss all of 2015. Thomas Roulis (.300/.344/.407) was set to serve as a team captain in his senior year, but instead will return next year after taking care of a sports hernia. Two weekend starters are also on the shelf as Beau Sulser (3-4, 5.51) is recovering from Tommy John surgery and Michael Danielak (1-5, 5.26) is unavailable due to a knee injury.

2014 All-Ivy Honors for the Green
After winning the Rolfe Division for a seventh straight year then falling in the best-of-three Ivy Championship Series at Columbia, Dartmouth had no less than eight players earn All-Ivy recognition, including RHP Duncan Robinson and 1B Dustin Selzer on the first team. On the second team were OF Jeff Keller, 3B Nick Lombardi and DH Joe Purritano, while SS Matt Parisi, 2B Thomas Roulis and OF Nick Ruppert earned honorable mention.

500 in the Books
It took three tries, but Dartmouth head coach Bob Whalen picked up his 500th victory with a 7-0 blanking of Brown on Easter Sunday, April 20, 2014. He is the only Big Green coach in any sport to win even 400 games, let alone 500, and he enters the 2015 season with a career mark of 507-474-1 in his first 25 seasons. In the Ivy League, he trails only Penn's Bob Sneddon (634 wins, 1971-2005), Princeton's Bill Clarke (564, 1909-44) and Cornell's Ted Thoren (541, 1962-90) in career victories.

Didn't Quite Break Even
In each of the previous six seasons prior to 2014, the Big Green had posted a winning percentage of at least .571. But Dartmouth was unable to finish the year with a winning record, going 18-21 overall. After struggling through the first half of the season, the Green righted the ship just in time, winning 12 of their last 15 regular-season contests, including their final six league games, to tie for the division title. Dartmouth finished off Yale in the playoff, 11-4, before dropping two at Columbia in the Ivy League Championship Series. Had the Big Green won the title, they would have had that .500 record at the very least.

Not Settling for Spares
Well, this isn't bowling, but if there is one thing the Big Green pitching staff does, it throws strikes. For the past six years, the staff has been one of the stingiest in the country in terms of issuing free passes. In both 2009 and 2010, the Big Green hurlers walked fewer batters per nine innings than any other Division I team. In each of the next three years, they ranked among the top 15, placing third in 2011 at 2.24 behind only Florida (1.82) and Dayton (2.18), eighth in 2012 at 2.33, and 13th in 2013 at 2.52. Last year was a bit of an outlier at 2.92 per nine, however, good for “only” 41st in the nation.

Two-Sport Talent
The Big Green feature a two-sport athlete on their roster in junior Bo Patterson. A starting wide receiver on the Dartmouth football team, Patterson worked his way into the starting lineup on the gridiron as a freshman and finished his rookie campaign leading the team in receiving yards (301) and second in receptions (24) with a pair of touchdowns. This past season, he led the Green with 25 catches, 395 receiving yards and six TD receptions.

Brotherly Baseball
Two years ago, RHP Beau Sulser got the opportunity to play with his older brother, RHP Cole Sulser, for one season before Cole was drafted by the Cleveland Indians. But there is another brotherly tandem on the mound for the Big Green as senior RHP Louis Concato and his sibling, sophomore RHP Mike Concato, make up half of the projected weekend rotation. They only get to play a second year together due to a medical waiver the elder Concato received for missing most of 2011, which is allowing him to compile statistics in five seasons. Before the Sulsers and the Concatos, the last set of brothers to be teammates on the Big Green were LHPs Russell and Robert Young during the 2007-08 seasons. Interestingly enough, the three pitchers who have graduated from this group have all been drafted by major league organizations.

Big League Bloodlines
Over the past decade, Dartmouth has had three players that had a father with big league ties. First was first baseman Mike Pagliarulo '09 whose father of the same name manned the hot corner with the Yankees, Padres, Twins, Orioles and Rangers over 11 seasons (1984-93, '95), hitting 134 homers in his career. Then came catcher Chris O'Dowd '13, son of Dan O'Dowd who served as the general manager for the Colorado Rockies for 15 years through 2014. Now the Big Green have Adam Charnin-Aker, whose father Jack Aker pitched as a reliever in the big leagues for 11 years (1964-74) with the Kansas City (then Oakland) Athletics, Seattle Pilots, Yankees, Cubs, Braves and Mets, going 47-45 with a 3.28 ERA and 124 saves in 495 appearances.

MLB Watch
Ed Lucas, a member of the Dartmouth Class of 2004, made his major league debut with the Miami Marlins on May 30, 2013 just nine days after his 31st birthday. The utility man played in 163 games for the Marlins over two seasons, then signed a minor-league deal with a spring training invite with the Texas Rangers this off-season.

A little more than one year later, Kyle Hendricks '12 made his MLB debut with the Chicago Cubs and finished the year with a 7-2 record over 13 starts with a 2.46 ERA. His classmate, Joe Sclafani '12, is the most likely alum to make it three in a row after hitting .339 in 226 at-bats as a utility player with the Houston Astros Triple-A club last year.

Draft Bonanza
Last year was the first time since 2007 that Dartmouth did not have at least one player selected in the MLB First-Year Player Draft. But in 2013, the squad produced three draft picks, the most ever for the Big Green in one season. Junior LHP Mitch Horacek was the first one chosen, selected in the ninth round as the 279th overall pick by the Baltimore Orioles. The next draftee was senior LHP Michael Johnson in the 14th round as the 424th overall selection by the Los Angeles Dodgers. Finally, senior RHP Cole Sulser was taken by the Cleveland Indians in the 25th round with the 741st overall pick.

The fourth member of the starting rotation, LHP Kyle Hunter, also signed with the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim as a free agent.