Baseball Closes Out Spring Trip at Jacksonville

DARTMOUTH (1-11) at JACKSONVILLE (13-8)
March 21-22, 2023 • John Sessions Stadium • Jacksonville, Fla.

Last Two Games of Spring Break
Dartmouth began this Florida swing well, earning its first victory of the season at USF, but has since dropped the last four. The Big Green have two more opportunities to boost their win total before returning to the Northeast with their first-ever games against Jacksonville on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Last Series in Review
• In the first game at UCF, the Knights had it going at the plate and on the mound as they handed Dartmouth a 16-1 defeat while belting five home runs and striking out 17 batters, the most against the Big Green in 27 years.
• Dartmouth got its bats going the next day, swatting a trio of solo homers while pounding out a season-high 15 hits, four by Kolton Freeman. But UCF rallied for nine runs in the eighth to take the second game, 12-10.
• Jack Metzger provided the best start on the mound this year in the game, yielding three runs on five hits and one walk over seven complete innings while striking out a career-high seven.
• Both Ivan Hoyt and Luke Carroll hit their first career round-trippers in the game, while Connor Bertsch hit his first of the season and sixth of his career.
• The final game in Orlando was a bit more subdued after the first inning ended with the Knights holding a 3-2 lead en route to a 5-2 triumph.
• Tyler Cox and Freeman are coming off impressive performances last week. Cox hit .667 (12-for-18) with a home run and four walks, raising his season average to .467, seventh in the country. Freeman, meanwhile, hit .571 (8-for-14) with two doubles and five walks, raising his season average 134 points to .351.
• While a 1-11 start is certainly not ideal, the last time Dartmouth had that record, it went on to go 16-4 in league play and earn a spot in the Ivy League Championship Series.

Overall Record vs. Jacksonville
• This is the first meeting between these two schools on the diamond.
• Since the start of the 2009 season, Dartmouth had a slightly winning record when playing in the Sunshine State (43-42), but this year the Big Green are 1-7.
• Showdowns with current Atlantic Sun teams have been rare in Dartmouth history with this the fifth game. The Big Green are 1-0 against Stetson, 0-2 versus North Florida and played Eastern Kentucky to a 1-1 tie in 2007.

Scouting the Dolphins
• Jacksonville opened conference play this past weekend, dropping two of three to Lipscomb, but the Dolphins also have victories over nationally ranked Florida and Miami this year.
• The offense may have an average of just .251, but thanks in part to 22 home runs in 21 games, it has scored about 6.4 runs per game.
• The two most dangerous hitters in the lineup are Kris Armstrong (.294/.371/.612), who has hit eight home runs and driving in 22 runs, and Chase Malloy (.280/440/.573), who leads the team with 12 extra-base hits with five long balls, 17 RBIs and a team-high 19 walks.
• The Dolphins like to swim … er … run having stolen 32 bases in 36 attempts with Cam Ridley a perfect 10-for-10.
• Evan Chrest anchoring the pitching staff with a 1.50 ERA in 30 innings with 39 strikeouts, but Dartmouth is unlikely to see the staff ace in a mid-week game
• Overall, Dolphins pitchers have a 5.68 ERA, striking out 206 batters over 191.2 innings while holding opponents to a .265 average, but they have walked 109 and hit 42 batters.
• Defensively, Jacksonville is fielding .962 with 31 errors in 21 games, plus has thrown out nearly 30 percent of base stealers (13-of-44).
• Chris Hayes (Jacksonville '95) is in his seventh season as the Dolphins head coach having posted a record of 173-151 entering the series. Twice he has guided JU to an NCAA Regional appearance and has won an ASUN regular-season title as well as a tournament championship.

Probable Starting Pitchers
• Your guess is as good as mine as to who will step on the mound to start either game for the Big Green. My guesses? Senior LHP Luke Carpenter (0-0, 16.20) and junior RHP Brady Chappell (0-0, 30.00). Only because they have started at least one game in their careers.
• For Jacksonville, LHP Dakota Stone (1-1, 8.03) is scheduled to toe the slab on Tuesday with RHP Scout Updike (1-0, 3.48) ready to go on Wednesday.

What's Up Next
With spring break coming to an end, the conference schedule begins this weekend. Dartmouth travels to Princeton to take on the Tigers. This is the Big Green's first trip to Clarke Field in almost exactly seven years; the teams played at a neutral site in 2019 due to weather and the 2021 season was canceled due to the pandemic.

Cox Steering the Ship
A little rowing humor for you there. Junior Tyler Cox was 10th in the nation last year with a .402 average, and he has picked up right where he left off. At USF, Cox was a perfect 7-for-7 with a homer and three walks in the two games. Over the weekend, he was 5-for-11 against UCF to finish the week batting .667 with an on-base percentage of .727. He currently is hitting .467 on the season, seventh among Division I hitters, while ranking 14th in on-base percentage (.556), not to mention sixth toughest to strike out (once every 22.5 at-bats).

Four-Hit Freeman
Senior Kolton Freeman got off to a bit of a slow start this year with one hit in his first 12 at-bats. But he is currently in the midst of an eight-game hitting streak during which he has hit .480 (12-for-25) with eight walks and twice been hit by a pitch. On March 18, Freeman matched a career high with four hits in his four official at-bats to go with a walk. Entering this series, he has reached base safely in each of his last seven plate appearances.

Metzger Meets the Challenge
Through the first 10 games, Dartmouth had not gotten very good results from its starting pitchers, who had recorded an ERA approaching 12.00. But senior Jack Metzger, facing a potent UCF lineup on March 18, provided the best start of the season, completing seven innings on 93 pitches while surrendering just three runs on five hits and a walk to go with a career-high seven strikeouts. Although the right-hander left with a 9-3 lead, he did not figure into the decision when the Knights rallied to defeat the Big Green, 12-10.

Going Yard
Dartmouth blasted three home runs in the 12-10 loss to UCF, its most in just over a year (four at Gardner-Webb on March 6, 2022). Two of those long balls were hit by Big Green batters for the first time in their career — freshman Ivan Hoyt and sophomore Luke Carroll, the latter of whom missed his entire freshman campaign with an injury. For the season, Dartmouth has hit six round-trippers, with the only downside being all six have been of the solo variety.

Climbing New Hoyts
Freshman Ivan Hoyt, a two-sport athlete who is also a wide receiver on the football team, missed the first weekend of the year with a slight injury but has started each of the last nine contests, reaching base at least once in eight of those games. He showed off his power stroke with his first collegiate home run at UCF, a blast to center field, and he is tied for the team lead in RBIs. But his production isn't just at the plate; the rookie also tossed a perfect inning on the mound versus Wagner and will likely get more opportunities to perform as a two-way player.

First Victory
The Big Green broke into the win column on March 14 in their first game of the spring trip by defeating USF, 6-1. It wasn't just the first win for Dartmouth this year, but also the first for junior Clark Gilmore on the mound in just his third career appearance. The right-hander pitched five effective innings of relief, surrendering just one run on four hits and three walks while fanning four. Tyler Robinson dealt the initial offensive blow by lining a three-run triple in the third, and RBI singles by Jackson Hower, Tyler Cox and Kolton Freeman added to the cushion.

Schedules