Friday was a glorious but bittersweet day for me, and most likely also for many other long-time college baseball fans. Friday was the start of another sure-to-be enthralling college baseball season. But it was also the start of the final season of college baseball which will finish at the ol’ jewel of a stadium up on the hill in South Omaha – Rosenblatt Stadium, home of the College World Series since 1950. The Series will move to a new home next year in north downtown Omaha. 

 For the 39^th ranked Irish to finish their season on the sport’s biggest stage for the first time since 2002 and second time in the program’s history, they’ll need to find a mix of solid midweek pitching (to win some respectable non-conference games where they’ve slipped up the past few years under fourth-year coach Dave Schrage) and timely hitting as always. Prior to three years ago, Notre Dame had made the NCAA regionals eight consecutive years and posted 16 consecutive 40-win seasons. The Irish coach of most of those winning teams – Paul Mainieri. Mainieri just won the national title last season with perennial powerhouse LSU.

 Under Schrage, it’s been three NCAA misses for the Irish Nine, including a narrow miss last year after posting a solid final RPI in the low 40s but just not enough to overcome a fifth place finish in the Big East regular-season. The Irish certainly have the firepower and hunger to get back to the big stage. Posting two of the top recruiting classes in the country in the past four years should finally start to pay off. And the Irish have reassessed their overall outlook on goal-setting and on looking ahead after last year’s disappointing NCAA snub. This year, the team says, it’s more of a game-to-game, day-at-a-time approach.

Continue reading this post »

Many of us turned out the lights on the Irish hoops season following the loss at Rutgers, a team that was winless in the Big East until beating the Irish.  Perhaps that was a bit premature, as the Irish protected home court against two other bubble teams - Cincinnati and South Florida - and now find themselves back in the conversation with a 6-5 record in the best conference in the nation.

Against a somewhat listless Bearcats squad, the Irish got a classic Luke Harangody night, as the big man scored 37 and grabbed 14 boards.  Tim Abromaitis chipped in 22 and the backcourt of Tory Jackson and Ben Hansbrough dished out 17 assists, which helped facilitate an absurd 25 assists on 29 field goals night for Notre Dame.  Things were a little hairier against the Bulls, as a big first half lead was blown, only to have the game saved by a phenomenal second half from Jackson.  The senior point guard played fantastic defense against Dominique Jones down the stretch and got to the hoop repeatedly against the South Florida defense, finishing with 18 points.

If the Irish want to keep the ride going, they absolutely must win the next two games to get to 8-5 before a very tough closing stretch.  Next up?  A trip to Seton Hall, a 12-9 team that's already been through the toughest part of their Big East schedule.  They're led by the inside-outside combination of Jeremy Hazell and Herb Pope, a talented duo that's going to give the Irish all kinds of trouble.  Hazell's a rangy 6'5" guard scoring 22 a game, while Pope's averaging a double-double and two blocks, meaning that securing the paint is going to be incredibly important.

Ty Nash has been playing well on the interior, but he's going to need some more help from Gody.  Luke's been spending more time on the perimeter this year, and it shows in his offensive rebounding numbers.  It's not a matter of effort - Harangody is still one of the better defensive rebounders in the country - but the fact that when he's on the perimeter taking shots, he's just not close enough to basket to be an effective weapon on the glass.  Against Cincinnati, Harangody spent more time around the paint and it showed in both his shooting (15 for 25) and number of offensive boards (six, a season high). 

Using KenPom's rebounding rate numbers - basically, the percentage of available boards a player gets while he's on the floor - you can see that Gody isn't as productive on the offensive glass this season compared to the last couple years.

Oddly enough, the Irish are actually better as a team on the offensive boards this season than they were last year.  I would suspect most of that can be attributed to Hansbrough being a great rebounding guard and Abro slighting improving on Ayers' rate from last year.  There are a lot of things the Irish need to finish the season strong and get back to the NCAA Tournament, but one of the most important is for Harangody to re-establish himself on the offensive glass.  Considering the big guy is currently below 30% from behind the arc, I don't think the Irish will miss his outside contributions too much if he turns his attention inside.

(Just as an aside, Dejuan Blair's offensive rebounding rate last year was an absurd 23.6, meaning he essentially grabbed one out of every four missed shots for the Panthers.  The fact he's playing in this weekend's Rookie vs. Sophomore game and leading all rookies in rebounding is not surprising.)

Tonight at 8:05pm Eastern on ESPN, dual sport Irish star Jeff Samardzija will stride to the mound at Wrigley Field to start a game for the first time.  The Cubbies are in a bit of a mid-August tailspin, so the Friendly Confines will be quite anxious to see his debut.  Heightening the drama even more?  This is the Philadelphia debut of former Cy Young winner Pedro Martinez.  It should be a very, very interesting night on the North Side, and for all the Shark coverage you could ever want tonight, check out SBNation's epic, sprawling, amazing Cubs blog, Bleed Cubbie Blue.

Samardzija has seen the Phillies before, including giving up a 13th inning  three-run walk off to Jayson Werth last month (but after pitching a perfect inning of relief in the 12th!).

Despite a slow start in a conference play and a disappointing 22-14 record overall – 8-7 Big East – the Irish have a lot to play for in this second half of the season. Over the weekend, the Irish took the home series 2-1 against first-place and nationally ranked West Virginia. It would have been easy for Notre Dame to fold and get swept by the Mountaineers after a 19-3 drubbing Friday at Eck Stadium, but the team stuck together, got some timely hitting in Saturday’s first game and some stellar pitching from junior Eric Maust in the second game of the doubleheader. Sunday’s game three of the series was moved to Saturday afternoon because of impending inclement weather.

With the series win against the Mountaineers, the Irish should have some renewed confidence as they hit the home stretch of the conference season. Notre Dame currently sits in fifth place in the Big East standings but still plays three of the four teams ahead of it (the other is West Virginia), South Florida (24-14, 12-3), Louisville (27-10, 11-4), and St. John’s (20-14, 9-6). There’s really a lot of baseball left to be played, and the Irish, in a way, control their own Big East tournament seeding destiny. Hopefully the West Virginia series can serve as a turning point in this up-and-down season, though the series itself shows Notre Dame’s shoddy inconsistency. The Irish went from doing nothing right in a 19-3 loss to the conference leaders to outplaying the Mountaineers in back-to-back games Saturday.

West Virginia came into the series batting an impressive .363 and 47 home runs as a team. Both of those statistics are still good enough, far and away, for best in the conference. The team batting average is third best in the nation. The Mountaineers lead the conference in batting average by .13 points. In Friday’s opener, Notre Dame sophomore Cole Johnson (4-1), who at times this season has looked unhittable, got roughed up by the powerful West Virginia offense. The righty gave up 11 runs on ten hits in five innings, suffering his first loss of the season. Once Johnson left, the pitching and defense didn’t get much better. The Irish defense had two costly errors, and freshman Dustin Ispas surrendered six runs, two earned. Sam Elam followed, giving up two earned runs. On a day when nothing seemed to go right, the Irish needed a quick turnaround. Saturday would be much different.

Continue reading this post »

Notre Dame baseball (10-5) plays its first home game today, St. Patrick’s Day, at 5 p.m. against Ball State. Freshman lefty Dustin Ispas will start for the Irish, who have won six out of their past seven games and seven out of their past nine.

Over the weekend, Notre Dame finished its own tournament, the Irish Baseball Classic, with a 3-1 record, losing Thursday against Illinois State but winning the remaining games against Trinity (Texas) and two against Texas Pan-American. Illinois State won the tournament, sweeping the field 4-0.

Against Illinois State, the Irish bats were relatively quiet – with runners in scoring position – as the Irish fell 3-2. Notre Dame stranded eight base runners in the game. Starter Cole Johnson did not factor in the decision. He pitched seven innings and yielded two earned runs. Todd Miller, who pitched two innings of relief and gave up the winning run to the Redbirds, took the loss. No Irish batter managed more than one hit. A.J. Pollock, Jeremy Barnes, Cameron McConnell, and Greg Sherry collected one apiece. Friday games in San Antonio were rained out.

Continue reading this post »

Texas has been kind to Irish baseball this spring break, as the Irish improved to 4-1 in the state over the past week. Notre Dame swept a two-game set with Grambling State in San Antonio Tuesday and Wednesday. With the victories, the Irish improved to 7-4 in non-conference play, having won four out of their past five games.

Continue reading this post »

Notre Dame improved to 5-4 overall after a 2-1 finish in the Rice Classic in Houston over the weekend. The Irish picked up a solid win Friday night, beating Oral Roberts in a pitcher's duel 2-1. In a rotation shakeup, sophomore Cole Johnson started for the Irish and pitched a gem. Johnson pitched seven strong innings - allowing just two hits and striking out a career high seven. Notre Dame opened the scoring in the bottom of the third inning when sophomore catcher Cameron McConnell led off with a walk. Sophomore outfielder Golden Tate then laid down a sacrifice bunt to advance McConnell to second base. Last year's Cape Cod League MVP A.J. Pollock followed with a double down the left field line. Pollock finished 2-4 for the game.

The bats were quiet the rest of the way for both teams until Oral Roberts tied the game in the top of the eighth inning with a leadoff home run off Notre Dame reliever sophomore Todd Miller. Miller got out of the inning, though, and picked up the win after the Irish answered with a run in the bottom of the inning with a string of singles. Senior Jeremy Barnes knocked in the winning run. Barnes finished 2-4 on the day. Junior Steven Mazur picked up the save.

Continue reading this post »

If you haven't noticed recently, we've added coverage of Notre Dame baseball and hockey.  Josh is one of the more rabid hockey fans we know and we are glad he is on board covering arguably the best program on campus.  Tom will be writing a weekly recap about Irish baseball and this is his first article while we set him up with an account.  Tom is from Omaha and loves his college baseball and formerly followed the baseball team for The Observer a few years back.  A warm welcome to both Josh and Tom...

It’s typically difficult for northern teams to get out of the gate fast. Fortunately for the Irish, they’ve played northern teams so far. Notre Dame sits at 3-3 after finishing 2-1 in the Big Ten-Big East challenge, with wins against Illinois and Purdue and a loss to Ohio State, and after finishing 1-2 in the Phoenix Classic, with a win against Dayton and losses against Gonzaga and Creighton.

This weekend provides another opportunity for the Irish to get some early-season quality wins when they head to Houston for the Rice Classic. There, Notre Dame will face a formidable schedule in Oral Roberts (a solid tournament team from a year ago), #5 Rice (a College World Series qualifier last year), and Washington State (an improving team in the ever-tough Pac 10 Conference).

Continue reading this post »