BB: NESCAC: New England Small College Athletic Conference

[Old Spartan]

Lots of NESCAC action starting soon, Trinity opens in Florida tomorrow.  Now the discussions can relate to actual games rather than predictions, always more interesting.

[Nuke LaLoosh]

Tufts lost 13-9 to Lynchburg in season opener in VA.

Steve Ragonese, who hit 9 home runs last year, went deep in his first at bat for Tufts.

[JustAFan]

Trinity sweeps its opener against Denison today, winning the first game 5-0 and the second game 3-2.  No box scores have been posted yet on the Trinity website.

Tufts freshman outfielder Ian Goldberg went 3-5 with 3 RBI's in his debut for the Jumbos and he also pitched an inning of relief.  Tufts non-pitching starters included only one senior (Ragonese) along with 3 juniors, 4 sophs and a freshman.

[Nuke LaLoosh]

JustAFan,

Tufts has two Goldbergs: Ian and Jordan (not related I don't think)

Ian plays LF and Jordan is a pitcher. I'm not sure if Ian pitches, but I would guess it was Jordan who threw an inning in relief. Correct me if I'm wrong, I only checked the box score.

Tufts only has 3 seniors on its roster, with Ragonese and the two pitchers Telian and Protano. Their sophs and freshmen are their best classes.

[JustAFan]

The box score listed Ian Goldberg as the pitcher but I think you're right that it was Jordan Goldberg since no one subbed for Ian in the outfield. This won't be the last time this mixup occurs this season.

Other NESCAC scores from Saturday:

Amherst dropped its opener to Babson, 11-4.  Amherst was down 1-0 after 5 innings on the strength of some strong pitching by senior Chris Edgar (5 IP, 0 earned runs, 4 hits, 4 K's) but Amherst didn't give junior Ryan Platzbecker any support when he came on in the sixth, surrendering 5 more unearned runs.  Babson posted 5 more runs in the next 2 innings to take an 11-0 lead heading into the ninth before Amherst got on the board.  Amherst only had 6 hits for the day.

Bowdoin ran its Arizona trip record to 4-2 with a 15-6 win over Dickinson to go along with 2 wins over Pitt-Bradford, a split with Central and a loss to Cortland State. After its opening 8-0 shutout of Pitt-Bradford the Polar Bears' pitching staff has given up 10, 8, 9, 13 and 6 runs but its potent offense has scored 17, 11, 10, 18 and 15 runs.  No box scores have been posted giving details on individual performances.

Wesleyan is having its best spring break trip in several years, posting a 5-3 record so far. After going 1-4 in its opening set of games against Menlo College and Westmont College, Wesleyan beat La Sierra College, swept Occidental on Friday (12-4 and 12-11) and yesterday beat Rutgers-Camden 9-7 in 10 innings.  Like Bowdoin, the Cardinals are flexing their offensive muscles down south, averaging 10.5 runs a game so far and batting .365. They already have hit 8 home runs, which surpasses their season total for 2007.  Senior Graham Douds is batting .520 with 2 home runs while 3 other Cardinals are hitting over .400 (senior Louis Gabel (5 doubles, 1 triple and 1 HR, 3-4 on stolen bases), junior Drew Dominguez (5 doubles) and soph Brice Kelly).   Junior Jonathan Sargent is 2-0 with a 0.00 ERA in 9 innings of work, while senior Kit Tholen is 1-1 in 2 starts and junior Dusty Mones 1-0 in 2 starts.

Bates opened its season yesterday with a split against the Elms, winning the first game 11-7 and losing the second game 7-5.

[JustAFan]

Tufts continues to get tested early by southern teams that are in mid-season form.  Friday the Jumbos lost to a 13-6 Lynchburg College team that had won 8 of its last 9 outings. This afternoon Tufts dropped a 5-3 decision to Averett College (10-14)  in a game the Jumbos probably should have won.  Tufts outhit Averett 10-8 but left 12 men on base, hit into 2 rally-ending double plays and committed 4 errors. Tufts senior Jason Protano pitched well, strking out 9 thru 5 innings, including 6 of the first 7 hitters, and only gave up 2 hits and one unearned run thru 5, but he ran out of gas in the sixth and was touched up for 3 runs on 4 hits. Freshman pitcher Ed Bernstein pitched a scoreless seventh for the Jumbos and freshman pitcher Jack Dilday also had a scoreless inning of relief for the second game in a row.  Sophomore Alex Gryzmala led Tufts with 3 hits while senior Steve Ragonese went 2-5 and freshman Ian Goldberg had 2 RBI's.

[JustAFan]

Scores from Sunday and today:

Williams opened its season with a sweep of Albertus Magnus, 11-2 and 5-4 (8 inn.) Three freshmen had key hits in the Ephs come from behind win in the second game, led by first year Pat Barren, who went 3-4. First year Dan Marcet got the start for Williams and threw 3 scoreless innings.  In the opening game, junior Dan Benz picked up where he left off last year, pitching a complete game 3 hitter and carrying a no hitter into the 5th. 

More impressive showings by first years:  Amherst upped its record to 3-1 with a sweep of Plymouth State today, 17-3 and 8-3, behind starting efforts by freshmen pitchers Mike Sutton and Jeff Keenan.  And yesterday first year pitcher James Cetkovski led the Jeffs to a 23-4 win over Nichols College.

Tufts got its first win this morning, beating SUNY-Purchase 15-10.  The Jumbos then lost a heartbreaker to a good (12-11) Guilford College team in the afternoon by a 14-13 score in 13 innings in a game that saw 3 Tufts freshmen pitchers see significant action.  After spotting Guilford an 8-1 lead on 5 unearned runs after 3 innings, the Jumbos fought back and ultimately tied the score at 11-11 with 3 runs in the top of the ninth.  Tufts then scored 2 more in the tenth to take a 13-11 lead.  After getting the first two batters in the bottom of the tenth, Tufts let up 2 runs that tied the score, and Guilford quickly scored the winning run in the bottom of the eleventh. The Jumbos defense continues to be surprisingly porous, as they committed 5 errors against Guilford and several more against Purchase.  With better defense Tufts might be 3-1 right now rather than 1-3.

Bates finished up its brief Florida trip at 1-4 with losses to Clarkson (3-10) and Grove City College (2-8 and 4-5).   

Bowdoin kept up its hammering ways with a 15-6 win over Dickinson yesterday that upped the Polar Bears record to 4-2.

Not to be outdone by Bowdoin on the offensive front, Wesleyan spotted Franklin & Marshall a 10-4 lead yesterday after 5 innings and saw a 6 run rally in the bottom of the ninth just fall short on a deep fly to center as the Cardinals dropped a 16-15 decision to drop to 5-4 on the season. Wesleyan pounded out 17 hits but 5 errors proved costly.  Is it time to return to wood bats in DIII? The two teams play a rematch tomorrow.

In contrast to all of these early season slugfests, Trinity showed off the incredible strength of its pitching staff with season opening wins over a good (7-2) Denison team, 5-0 and 3-2 (Tim Kiely and Chandler Barnard combined for 15 K's in 14 innings), and Scranton, 14-3 (Michael Regan 2 hits, 6 K's in 6 innings).  Today the Bantams swept 1-2 Carroll College of Wisconsin, 8-3 amd 10-0. 

[Nuke LaLoosh]

I think with this particular young and inexperienced Tufts team Casey might try to use his Southern trip more to figure out what 9 guys are going to be the everyday players when the team returns North. He's already shown he's not afraid to shuffle a variety of different players into his line-up.

It seems freshmen outfielder Ian Goldberg is the real deal. He went yard in his first AB at Guilford, and has multiple multi-hit games thus far.

[Rick Vaughn]

Nice start across the board by the NESCAC. 

The league can really hit it:

Allemand and Pinto have combined for 8 triples in 10 games following a split with Gustavus Adolphus

Ragonese, Berte (Bowdoin), Simpson (Wes Tech) and Augustyn (Hamilton) all already have three bombs.

And Wes Tech with 12 bombs in 14 games.  They must put something in the pot in Middletown.

Best early win: Williams over Keene St.

[Bostonian]

Tufts' win against NC Wesleyan and Trinity's win over St. Thomas are also extremely impressive wins...

[Old Spartan]

I have to second Bostonian:

In the NCBWA Top 25 on this very website, St Thomas is ranked 16th (defeated by Trinity), NC Wes is ranked 24th (defeated by Tufts) and Keene ST is ranked 25th (defeated by Williams).  Polls aren't everything but we should report the whole picture.

Also left out of the post on hitting was kent Graham of Trinity (who was named NESCAC player of the week see http://www.nescac.com/sports/bsb/2007-08/reports/NESCAC_BASE_032408.pdf?dec=) with 4 doubles, 3 triples and a home run notching 13 runs scored and 19 RBIs.

Don't mean to be partisan, but all of the facts should be presented.

Now that the NESCAC season is about to start we will see the true test of head on competition.

[Rick Vaughn]

St. Thomas and NC Wes maybe ranked higher, but the Keene St. win is an in-region win and holds more water for a possible at large. 

It will be interesting to see how much of a dip in production there is across the league once teams return to 35 degree temperatures and slower infields.

[Old Spartan]

I see what you mean about the "in region" game and agree that the hitting production is likely to decline.  It is also true that more pitchers get a chance to see action on the Spring Break trips than during the regular conference games which will also likely contibute to lower scoring contests.  Some teams are in action today and we should know for sure over the weekend.

[Rick Vaughn]

Williams taking advantage of their two week spring break and playing some good ball.  A tough four game in two days stretch against two good teams (Gustavus Adolphus and So Maine) ended in a 2-2 split.  One more game before a huge weekend vs Midd in Arizona. 

Any picks this weekend in league and possible pitching matchups?  I will go with what I know best.

Williams over Midd: 2 out of 3

Game 1: Benz (W) vs Wright (M)
Game 2 (7 innings): Horwitz (W) vs Britton (M)
Game 3: Gustafson (W) vs Palladino (M)

Midd has really been struggling and is 1-4 on their spring trip so far.  This series could be a bit of a chess match.  Since Britton will always start the 7, should Williams throw Gustafson and essential concede a game or really go after that game with Horwitz.  For me it would depend on if Benz can beat Wright in the first game.

To start the convo for other league series:  Trin sweeps Bowdoin, Wes 2 of 3 from Amherst (going out on a limb), and Tufts sweeps Bates (and they have to in order to stay in the playoff hunt).

[Bostonian]

Trin sweeps Bowdoin.
Tufts sweeps Bates.
Amherst wins 2 and ties once vs. Wesleyan (because it's Wesleyan)
Mid takes 2 of 3 from Williams.