Saturday, April 6
Easton, Pa.
12 p.m.
Bucknell University
at
Lafayette
Photo by: Lianne Garrahan
Baseball Heads to Lehigh Valley for Four Games this Weekend
4/3/2024 6:28:00 PM | Baseball
Bucknell (10-17, 3-8 PL) at Lafayette (6-21, 2-5 PL)
When:Â Saturday, April 6, 12 p.m. (DH)
Where:Â Kamine Stadium, Easton, Pa.
Watch:Â ESPN+
Live Stats:Â GoLeopards.com
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Bucknell (10-17, 3-8 PL) at Lehigh (16-10-1, 3-4 PL)
When:Â Sunday, April 7, 12 p.m. (DH)
Where:Â Walker Field at Legacy Park, Bethlehem, Pa.
Watch:Â ESPN+
Live Stats:Â LehighSports.com
Bucknell at a Glance
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When:Â Saturday, April 6, 12 p.m. (DH)
Where:Â Kamine Stadium, Easton, Pa.
Watch:Â ESPN+
Live Stats:Â GoLeopards.com
Â
Bucknell (10-17, 3-8 PL) at Lehigh (16-10-1, 3-4 PL)
When:Â Sunday, April 7, 12 p.m. (DH)
Where:Â Walker Field at Legacy Park, Bethlehem, Pa.
Watch:Â ESPN+
Live Stats:Â LehighSports.com
Bucknell at a Glance
- The Bison look to bounce back from a rough couple of days in Worcester when they travel to the Lehigh Valley for doubleheaders against Lafayette and Lehigh this weekend.
- Fitton Field has not been a friendly venue for the Bison in recent years, and the trend continued last week as Holy Cross swept Bucknell in a three-game series. The Crusaders took Saturday's doubleheader by scores of 4-2 and 6-4, and then used two big innings to break open a close game in Sunday's 15-4 verdict.
- Bucknell pitched fairly well on Saturday, getting a complete-game performance from Tyler O'Neill in the opener, but a lack of timely hitting proved costly. The Bison generated plenty of baserunners throughout the day but went just 5-for-22 with runners in scoring position.
- Despite the three losses, junior third baseman Sean Keys continued to rake, and he was selected as the Patriot League Player of the Week on Tuesday. Including last Tuesday's 16-14 win at Mount St. Mary's in which he went 4-for-5 and hit for the cycle, Keys was 9-for-16 (.563) on the week with six of the nine hits going for extra bases. Keys went 5-for-11 with a long home run in the three-game series at Holy Cross, and for the week he slashed .563/.632/1.250 for a whopping 1.882 OPS. He drove in seven runs and scored five times in the four games.
- Keys became the fourth Bucknell player ever to hit for the cycle. He followed Luke Nascimento's three-run double with an RBI double of his own to tie the game at 4-4 in the fourth and get his cycle started. Keys' seventh home run of the season leading off the top of the sixth pulled the Bison within 7-6, and his two-run triple into the right-field corner highlighted Bucknell's six-run seventh inning. Keys needed only the single to complete the cycle, and he got just that in the eighth when his chopper to the right side was fielded with a dive by first-baseman Shane Wockley, but he had no play on Keys at first. Bucknell's last cycle came from Bob Donato against Toledo in Winter Haven, Fla., in 2009. Coincidentally, Donato also finished off his cycle with a single. The only other cycles in team history came from Hall-of-Famer Ted Aceto against Pittsburgh in 1989 and Brian Hirschberg against Bloomsburg in 2003.
- Over the full season, Keys is now slashing .427/.545/.854 for an OPS of 1.399. He leads the Patriot League in all four of those categories, and nationally he ranks ninth in OPS, 12th in slugging, and 16th in on-base percentage.
- Keys was listed as the No. 7 third baseman in D1Baseball's preseason positional rankings, and he is holding steady at No. 8 in the site's midseason rankings, which were released earlier this week. Georgia star Charlie Condon, who many analysts project to be the No. 1 pick in the 2024 MLB Draft, sits atop DIBaseball's list of top-50 third basemen. Keys is the only player in the top 12 not from a team in the SEC or ACC. Ranked ahead of him are Condon, Tennessee's Billy Amick, Virginia Tech's Carson DeMartini, LSU's Tommy White, Alabama's Gage Miller, Florida State's Cam Smith, and Clemson's Blake Wright.
- Keys' home run at Holy Cross on Sunday was the 22nd of his career, moving him into the No. 5 spot on Bucknell's all-time list. He is one behind Donato for fourth. Keys is also up to 97 career RBIs, and he is close to becoming just the 12th player in team history to hit the 100-RBI mark.
- Sophomore Michael Trommer continues to wield a hot bat. He has emerged as Bucknell's everyday designated hitter and has raised his average to .360 by going 18-for-38 (.474) over his last 11 games. That is the fourth-highest average in the Patriot League. Trommer's 10-game hitting streak came to an end in the series finale at Holy Cross.
- Freshman shortstop Andrew Swenson is eighth in the league with a .323 average. Swenson also ranks fifth in the PL in slugging percentage (.629) and fourth in OPS (1.046). He has three home runs and 20 RBIs in 20 games this season.
- Senior LF Jacob Corson is slashing .290/.397/.533 for a .930 OPS, and he is second on the team in RBIs with 24 despite hitting in the leadoff spot. Corson hit his fifth home run of the season in the Holy Cross series.
- Bucknell ranks second in the Patriot League with a .282 team batting average and a .423 slugging percentage.
- The Bison have struggled at times on the mound this season and come into the weekend with an 8.57 team ERA. ÂÂBut No. 1 starter Tyler O'Neill is coming off two good outings, and freshman Jake Schultz picked up his first win with a strong relief outing at Mount St. Mary's. Schultz began the season in the rotation but missed two starts due to injury. Sophomore Mikey Myro and freshman Jack O'Malley have also had quality outings.
- O'Malley has struck out 38 batters in 22.1 innings this season. As a staff, the Bison have 218 strikeouts in 210.0 innings, but they have also walked 175 and hit 47 batters. Â
- Head coach Scott Heather is in his 12th season at the helm, tying him with Bill Lane (1946-57) as the third-longest tenured coach in program history. Heather's 211 career wins are second-most in team history, trailing only Hall-of-Famer Gene Depew (591).
- In each of the past two seasons, Bucknell has fallen to Army in the best 2-of-3 Patriot League championship series. The Black Knights have won each of the last five titles. Army and Bucknell were picked 1-2 in this year's preseason poll.Â
- Lafayette played a very tough non-conference schedule that included series against Oregon, East Tennessee State, Delaware, Wofford, Campbell, and Penn. The Leopards split a four-game home series with rival Lehigh to start Patriot League play, but after beating Saint Joseph's in a mid-week game, they lost all three at Navy last weekend.
- Lafayette's top hitters are Ethan Swidler (1.019) and Blaze Fadio (.988), who both rank in the top 10 in the Patriot League in OPS. Fadio's .323 batting average is seventh-best in the league, and his 27 RBIs rank sixth. He had back-to-back 5-RBI games against Lehigh and Saint Joseph's on March 24 and 26.
- Fadio, Swidler, and Ben Petrone all have five home runs, and all three rank in the top 10 in the PL In slugging percentage.
- Lafayette has struggled on the mound with a 10.36 team ERA.
- Bucknell is 84-124-1 all-time against Lafayette. The Bison won three of the five games last season, winning by scores of 11-0, 20-2, and 8-5 before the Leopards won the last two 8-7 (12 inn.) and 17-11.
- Bucknell hit .358 in the five games against Lafayette last season. Among the returnees, Nic Adamo (.462), Sean Keys (.455), Tyler Dunn (.320), and Billy Kender (.300) all hit at least .300. Keys drove in 10 runs in the five games, including a go-ahead three-run double in the seventh and final inning of the 8-5 win in Easton.
- Lehigh has had a strong season to date with a 16-10-1 overall record and a 3-4 mark in the Patriot League. The Mountain Hawks had a good showing at the Swig & Swine Classic in Charleston to start the campaign, posting a 2-0 win over Michigan State and an 8-4 win over No. 20 Iowa.
- In Patriot League play, Lehigh split a four-game series with Lafayette and dropped two of three to Army this past weekend. The Mountain Hawks will host Navy for a pair on Saturday before taking on Bucknell on Sunday.
- Two of the league's top third basemen will square off on Sunday with Bucknell's Sean Keys and Lehigh's Rafe Perich. They enter the weekend ranked 1-2 in the Patriot League batting race, with Keys at .427 and Perich at .394. Perich also ranks third in the league in OBP (.496), fourth in SLG (.635), and third in OPS (1.131).
- Justin Butler is the league leader in home runs (9) and RBIs (38). He has a pair of two-homer games against Iowa and Mount St. Mary's.
- Lehigh leads the Patriot League with a 5.05 team ERA and 227 strikeouts.
- Marcus Danchision leads the league in ERA at 2.30, while Teddy Toliver ranks fourth at 4.41.
- Tommy Lamar is tied for the league lead with five saves.
- Bucknell is 114-99 all-time against Lehigh, including seven wins in the last eight meetings. The Bison swept the Mountain Hawks in the 2022 Patriot League Tournament semifinal series and then won four of the five meetings last season, including a couple of dramatic wins.
- In the first meeting of last season, Keys hit a 463-foot, walk-off three-run homer to give the Bison a 6-4 win at Depew Field. Later in the season, Grant Voytovich hit two three-run homers in an 8-7 win in Bethlehem, and the Bison capped off that series with another 8-7 victory when Jacob Corson hit a three-run bomb with the Bison trailing 7-5 with two outs in the top of the ninth.
- Voytovich hit .333 with two homers and 12 RBIs in the five games against Lehigh last season.
- After playing eight straight games on the road, the Bison are scheduled to play at home on Wednesday against Mount St. Mary's. Lehigh will then be back in Lewisburg for three games on the weekend of Apr. 13-14.
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