The Dartmouth men's baseball team dropped four straight games to Ivy League and Red Rolfe Division opponent Yale University in New Haven, Conn., this weekend. The Big Green (18-10, 6-6 Ivy) could not muster any offense in the four contests, scoring only three runs in the 6-1, 5-1, 3-0 and 5-1 losses.
Dartmouth, hitting .327 going into the weekend, only hit .205 in the series and struck out 28 times.
The losses push the Big Green to second in the division, behind Yale (20-12, 8-4 Ivy).
We felt good coming off our four-game sweep of Cornell and Princeton and our midweek win against Boston College," Sam Bean '11 said. "We saw this weekend as a great opportunity to gain some ground in the race for our division."
In the first game against the Bulldogs, the teams were evenly matched. The game was scoreless through the third inning despite a bases-loaded opportunity in the second that Dartmouth did not use to score any runs. Yale finally put two on the board in the fourth against Big Green lefty Kyle Hunter '13. The Bulldogs scored three more in the fifth to make it a 5-0 game.
Dartmouth attempted to come back in the sixth with Chris O'Dowd '13 drawing a one-out walk and Jason Brooks '11 doubling to center in the next at bat, scoring O'Dowd. The rally was short-lived, however, as the next two batters were retired.
Yale came back in the bottom of the inning to score its last run, making the score 6-1. Hunter finished the game with ten hits, five errors and no strikeouts.
We didn't compete during our at-bats," Bean said. "We acted like showing up and playing was going to be enough to win four games."
In Dartmouth's second game against Yale, the Bulldogs started strong, scoring four runs in the first two innings. Despite the rocky start, Cole Sulser '12 would retire fifteen straight batters and keep the Bulldogs from scoring again until the bottom of the eighth.
Dartmouth remained off the scoreboard until the ninth inning despite having many opportunities and leaving twelve men on base throughout the game.
The Big Green was finally able to string together some offense in the ninth when David Turnbull '12 singled and Joe Sclafani '12 and Bean both singled one out later, scoring Turnbull. O'Dowd followed with a single to load the bases and brought Brooks the tying run to the plate. After a Bulldog pitching change, however, Brooks struck out to end the game.
During the Big Green's second day in New Haven, Dartmouth continued to struggle offensively, scoring only one run on the afternoon. Yale began the game with a run in the first against Kyle Hendricks '12. The Bulldogs scored twice more in the both the fifth and sixth innings to bring the score to 3-0.
"We realized we had played badly the day before and fully expected to win the first game on Sunday," Bean said. "Winning that game would have put us back in first in our division going into game four. We always expected to bounce back with a win.
The final game of the series was marked with the same offensive struggle of the previous three games. The game remained scoreless until the bottom of the third, when Yale had an explosive offensive inning, scoring all five of its runs against freshman lefty Mitch Horacek '14. Horack was replaced by freshman Mike Dodakian '14, who pitched a scoreless 4.1 innings.
Despite putting together a few consecutive hits in several innings, the Big Green stayed off the scoreboard until the eighth. Sclafani scored the only Dartmouth run of the day, scoring off of a single from Bean after a triple of his own.
The Big Green will be back in action defending its sixteen home-game win streak on Tuesday against Saint Anselm College, as it begins an eight home game stretch. Dartmouth plays Hartford University on Wednesday and returns to conference play against Brown University on Saturday.
