Bowling Green State University Athletics
Falcon Baseball Team Back On The Road At Louisville This Weekend
February 24, 2009 | Baseball
Feb. 24, 2009
BOWLING GREEN, OHIO -
Week 2 BGSU Baseball Notes/Stats (vs. Louisville) 
Games #4-6
Bowling Green (0-3, 0-0 MAC) at Louisville (0-3, 0-0 Big East)
Feb. 27-28 and March 1, 2009 • Louisville, Ky. (Jim Patterson Stadium - 2,500 - Field Turf) • 2:00 - Friday; 1:00 - Saturday and Sunday
FALCONS BATTLE 2008 BIG EAST CHAMPION LOUISVILLE
The Bowling Green State University baseball team will play its second series of the season when they battle nationally-ranked Louisville this weekend. All games of the Friday, Saturday and Sunday series will be played at Jim Patterson Stadium on the Louisville, Ky. campus. The Friday game will start at 2 p.m. while the remaining games of the series both start at 1 p.m.
SERIES INFORMATION
This weekend will be the first meeting between two programs.
WHAT A WAY TO START
Bowling Green opened the season last week on the road against Western Carolina and senior shortstop Ryan Shay didn't waste any time getting the offense in overdrive hitting the first pitch of the 2009 season for a home run to right field. The Falcons went on to score four more runs in the opening inning of the season on a sacrifice fly by junior Logan Meisler and a three-run home run to right center by junior David Borcherdt. Unfortunately, that would be more than one-third of the runs the Falcons would get for the weekend. Shay, who was a first-team All-MAC and All-Mideast selection last season hitting a league-best .412, led off 21 games last season with hits, one of those a lead off homer.
SCORING VIA THE HOME RUN
The Falcons scored nine of their 14 runs in the weekend series with Western Carolina on the long ball. Besides Shay and Borcherdt's round-trippers in the opener, junior Derek Spencer, who was a first-team All-MAC selection a year ago, added a two-run homer to left field in the fifth inning. BG's only run in the middle game of the series came on a solo shot by junior T.J. Blanton to left field in the fifth inning. Two of Bowling Green's runs in the finale on Sunday were produced when junior Dennis Vaughn homered to right field with a man on.
BERRY TO MISS A COUPLE WEEKS
Junior Frank Berry II, who was expected to be the #1 starter this season, had bone spurs removed from his pitching elbow and is expected to miss the first couple weeks. Berry made 11 starts in his first year in the program last season after transferring from Longwood University. He led the staff with 70.0 innings of work and compiled a 7-1 record to go along with a 4.76 ERA. He was the opening game starter in all eight MAC series last season and he started the first game of the MAC Tournament for the Falcons. He went five or more innings in seven of his nine starts against MAC teams. His seven wins was the second-best total in the conference. He also is a career .264 hitter.
A STRUGGLING OFFENSE
After leading the MAC hitting .321 as a team last season, the Falcons struggled at the plate in the opening series of the season with basically the same lineup as a year ago. The Falcons hit only .182 for the weekend and did not have an extra-base hit except for the five home runs. BG batters struck out 36 times leading to a team on-base percentage of .261 for the three games. Last season, BG had a team on-base percentage of .392, which was third in the league. Falcon hitters were caught looking at a third strike 15 times last weekend.
PITCHERS HAVE ROUGH WEEKEND
The pitching staff also struggled in their first action of the season off a dirt mound. BG's staff had a 9.75 ERA in 24 innings of work with 16 strikeouts and 15 walks. Falcon pitchers also hit 11 batters in the three games while yielding 37 hits and 26 earned runs.
GERDEMAN HAS GOOD DEBUT
Freshman hurler Ross Gerdeman pitched 4.2 innings in relief in the middle game of the series last weekend and gave up just one run, it was unearned, and two hits while striking out two. He faced 16 batters in his collegiate debut and had three consecutive innings, the fifth through seventh innings, in which he retired the side in order without a ball going out of the infield.
OTHER ROOKIES SEE ACTION
Besides Gerdeman, seven other players saw action in the first collegiate game over the weekend. Junior college transfers Matt Malewitz and Tyler Elkins along with freshmen Kacy Dwornik, Tyler Basilone, Jon Berti and Matt Vannett all saw action. Red-shirt freshman Patrick Martin, who sat out last season with an injury, also played. Malewitz started the middle game of the series against Western Carolina and went three innings allowing three earned runs with four strikeouts. Elkins played in all three games, making one start behind the plate. He had one hit in five trips to the plate. Dwornik and Basilone both made one relief appearance while Berti started one game as the designated hitter and one in right field going one-for-six getting his first collegiate hit in the series finale. Vannett pinch hit in the Sunday game while Martin collected two hits in three trips to the plate playing in two of the contests. Martin collected his first collegiate hit in the season opener as a pinch hitter.
RETURNING ALL-LEAGUE
Bowling Green has two players returning this season who were All-MAC choices last season. Senior shortstop Ryan Shay and junior third baseman Derek Spencer were both first-team all-conference selections in 2008. Shay led the league and was 22nd nationally with a .412 average while Spencer was eighth in the league hitting .360. Shay, whose average last season was 155 points higher than his career average coming into the season, hit safely in 46 of the 52 games setting school records for batting average, hits (87) and doubles (19). He had a 16-game hitting streak and a 17-game hitting streak, fourth-best in school history. Spencer led the team with 54 RBI (third in the MAC, tied for eighth on BGSU single-season list) and in extra-base hits (25) and two-out RBI (21). He did not go more than two games at any point in the season without getting a hit.
FALCON CAPTAINS
Seniors Ryan Shay (SS), Dusty Hawk (RHP), Brian Hangbers (1B) and Kevin Leady (RHP) will serve as captains of the 2009 team. Leady will not play this season after having surgery in November.
EARLY SEASON HONORS
Senior shortstop Ryan Shay was picked as one of the top seven shortstops in the country by the web site Ping!Baseball. The web site picked the top players in the country for their preseason All-American list and included Shay among the best shortstops in the land. Shay also was named to the preseason All-MAC team by Baseball America. In the same publication, freshman Jon Berti was picked as the second-best newcomer in the MAC this season.
FALCONS THIRD IN EAST
The 2009 Falcon team was picked third in the MAC East Division in a preseason poll of the conference coaches that was released last week. Bowling Green shared the 2008 East Division and MAC regular season titles with Kent State as both finished with a 16-8 mark in loop action. BG was picked behind Kent State and Ohio in the East. Western Michigan was the pick of the coaches to capture the West Division. Kent was picked as the heavy favorite to win the MAC Tournament.
2009 MAC Preseason Coaches Poll
East Division
1. Kent State
2. Ohio
3. Bowling Green
4. Miami
5. Akron
6. Buffalo
West Division
1. Western Michigan
2. Ball State
3. Central Michigan
4. Northern Illinois
5. Eastern Michigan
6. Toledo
LOUISVILLE NOTES
The Cardinals are coming off a 41-21 campaign that saw them win the Big East Tournament title to earn a berth in the NCAA Tournament for the second successive season...Louisville returns 20 letterwinners from last year's squad and eight of their nine starters in the field...they also started the season last weekend losing a three-game series at 11th-ranked Florida by scores of 6-3, 10-4 and 3-2...UL hit just .228 as a team in the series while their pitching staff had a 5.47 ERA...sophomore Phil Wunderlich led the team hitting .556 while junior Andrew Clark and sophomore Josh Richmond hit .333....Louisville, the preseason Big East favorite to repeat as champions, had three home runs and five extra-base hits in the series...junior third baseman Chris Dominguez, who was tabbed as the preseason National Player of the Year by The Sporting News, was held in check by the Gator pitchers collecting one hit in 10 at-bats...he hit .365 with 21 home runs and 75 RBI last season...Louisville was ranked anywhere from eighth to 23rd in the nation in preseason polls done by various publications and web sites...junior left-hander Justin Marks was chosen as the preseason Pitcher of the Year by the Big East coaches after going 9-2 last season with a 2.37 ERA and 89 strikeouts in 91 innings of work...he went five innings in his start last weekend allowing three earned runs and three hits while striking out three...junior right-hander Matt Lea and sophomore Dean Kiekhefer also started games against Florida...Louisville head coach Dan McDonnell is in his third season and has been picked by USA Baseball as an assistant coach for the 2009 National Team.
FALCON BLOOP SINGLES
The Falcons won their last six road games of 2008, but had that streak end over the weekend at Western Carolina...BG was 16-8 on the road last season...senior Dusty Hawk drew the opening game assignment last week and pitched three innings allowing five hits, two earned runs and he had two strikeouts...Hawk is expected to be the Falcon closer this season when the pitching staff gets healthy...Western Carolina had a nine-run seventh inning in the first game last weekend and they had a six-run sixth in the series finale...sophomore Brennan Smith started the final game of the series last weekend and went 3.2 innings allowing six hits and four earned runs while striking out two...the Falcons turned four double plays in the opening series...BG had 59 double plays last season which tied for the MAC lead and ranked tied for 26th nationally...BG's average of 1.13 double plays per game was 14th in the country last season...junior Mark Galvin ended last season with an eight-game hitting streak during which he hit .469...Galvin went hitless in seven at-bats over the weekend...the Falcons hit only .125 (eight-of-64) in the last two games of the series last week while striking out 24 times...the Falcons were one-for-19 last weekend with runners in scoring position...the Falcons used 12 different pitchers last weekend with only senior Marty Baird and sophomore Kyle Atkinson making multiple appearances...BG started 1-6 last season before playing .688 baseball (31-14) the rest of the season.
NEXT WEEK
The Falcons have a mid-week game, Tuesday, March 3 at Dayton, before leaving Friday, March 6 for their spring trip to Winter Haven, Fla. The Dayton game is a 2 p.m. start. BG's schedule for their spring trip follows. All their games in Florida will be played at the Chain Lakes complex, the former spring training home of the Cleveland Indians, except the Northern Iowa contest.
Sat., March 7 - 3:00 - Fairfield
(Chain Lakes #1)
Sun., March 8 - 4:00 - East. Kentucky
(Chain Lakes Stadium)
Mon., March 9 - 12:30 - Bucknell
(Chain Lakes Stadium)
Tue., March 10 - 12:30 - Connecticut
(Chain Lakes Stadium)
Thur., March 12 - 9 a.m. - Sacred Heart
(Chain Lakes Stadium)
Fri., March 13 - 10 a.m. - Northern Iowa
(Henley Field)
Sat., March 14 - 9 a.m. - Indiana
(Chain Lakes Stadium)
Sat., March 14 - 12:30 - Bradley
(Chain Lakes Stadium)
