...on the baseball field that is. For the first time in history Georgia State will host Harvard on the diamond tomorrow, Wednesday the 17th, at 5 PM. This is only the 2nd Ivy League school Georgia State has faced. The only other meeting with an Ivy League opponent was in 1998 when GSU home-swept the Cornell Big Red at Panthersville in a 3-game series. This game comes two days after the Panthers beat the Alabama State Hornets 14-4 bringing their record on the 2011 season to CAA best 14-4.Who: Harvard University Crimson, competes in NCAA D1 Ivy League play. Harvard enters tomorrow's game with a 1-9 record, their first win coming tonight over Kennesaw State University in a late-inning meltdown by the KSU pitching staff.
Previous Season: Harvard finished the 2010 season with a 17-26 record and near the bottom of the Ivy League in both pitching and offense.
Harvard at the Plate: The team is batting .241 with a .309 on-base percentage. Not much power has been displayed, their slugging only .306 with just 1 home run and 1 triple. This production is scoring about 3.2 runs per game. At the plate the team is striking out 3 times for every 1 walk earned. Junior Jeff Reynolds is leading the Crimson at the plate with a .367 and is the only starter hitting over .300.
Harvard on the Mound: The Harvard starting pitcher is currently unknown. Prior to today's game, the team ERA was 7.94 and they were allowing a little over 8 runs per game. That doesn't cut it and if you were wondering why they were 0-9 heading into today, averaging 3 runs on offense while allowing 8 is the reason. The Crimson have 1 pitcher who has not allowed a run and that pitcher is senior Zachery Hofeld. Hofeld earned the win against Kennesaw after pitching 4 innings of relief work and allowing only 1 hit and no runs. It's safe to say the Panthers will likely not see him tomorrow. Marcus Way and Joey Novak appear to be the potential starters as of now. Marcus is 0-1 and given up 8 runs in 3.2 innings pitched. Joey has given up 9 runs in 5.1 innings. Both pitchers have a WHIP (walks+hits per inning) of near 3.0. Give this Panthers lineup an average of 3 hits and/or walks per inning and they're going to put up some runs on you in a hurry considering the speed and ability to steal bases.
GSU at the Plate: The Panthers lineup is coming off a game with 13 hits and 14 runs scored so the bats are likely tuned in right now. The team is hitting .292 led by outfielder Brett Maxwell who sports a cool .442 average and leads the team in doubles with 7. Rob Lind enters the game with a streak of 14 consecutive plate appearances in which he reached base by walk or hit. Rob Lind leads the CAA with 26 walks in 79 plate appearances. This is not good for the opposing teams because once Rob is on base, he leads the Panthers with 6 steals and 9 attempts. The Panthers are 35-for-46 as a team. Mark Micowski is coming off a nice game at the plate after going 3-for-4 with a walk and 3 RBI's. Mark leads the Panthers with 17 RBI's. It's not everyday you see a lead-off hitter with the team high in RBI's. This is a testament to the production coming from the bottom of the lineup for the Panthers.
GSU on the Mound: Senior righty Will Campbell takes the mound for the Panthers bringing along a 3-0 record, one of 6 CAA pitchers holding a 3-o record (3 are Panthers). Will has a 2.62 ERA and opposing hitters are only batting .165 against him which is good for the best in the CAA. He has a WHIP of .83 after allowing a total of 13 hits and 7 walks in his 24 innings pitched. This is a great number for a starter. Will has allowed only one extra base hit coming in form of a double. The Panthers relief staff continues their outstanding work. There are 5 relievers (with minimum of 1 inning) who have opponent batting averages at or below .200 and they have yet to allow the long ball. The Panthers as a team have still allowed only 5 home runs with 3 from the Mercer game.
I expect an easy game for the Panthers tomorrow. Barring them being off their game (by a ton) tomorrow they should move on to this weekend's home series with Murray State owning a 15-4 record. The Panthers do everything better than the Crimson of Harvard. I know Kennesaw State was saying the same thing 12 hours ago but they are in somewhat of a funk right now. The Panthers are good, really good. Really good teams beat bad teams. GO PANTHERS!!!
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