The Dartmouth baseball team hosted two of the League’s top teams this weekend — Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania — splitting the doubleheader against the Lions (11-15, 5-3 Ivy) and dropping both games against the Quakers (15-10, 8-0 Ivy). The sweep of the Big Green on Sunday represents the first time the team has been taken in a doubleheader since Biondi Park was built in 2009.
The team (5-16, 2-6 Ivy) started off the weekend by taking on Columbia in a rematch of last season’s Ivy Championship series. The first game opened slowly with three scoreless innings, but the bleachers woke up in the fourth when Jeff Keller ’14 drove a single out to center, inches from the fielder’s glove, sending Matt Parisi ’15 to third with just one out. Dustin Selzer ’14 then sent a single far into left, batting in Parisi and putting Keller on second. The 1-0 lead was the first starting lead the Big Green had taken in Ivy play all season.
Nick Ruppert ’16 led off the sixth with a solo home run to left — his second of the season. With a 2-0 lead in the top of the seventh, a jumping catch by Keller saved Dartmouth’s lead but was unable to prevent the sacrifice from third, allowing time for Columbia to score and cut the Dartmouth lead to one.
After the hit to right, Duncan Robinson ’16 came in to close the game, but gave up a double to Lions leadoff man Jordan Serena, allowing another run for Columbia. Beau Sulser ’16, who went 6.2 innings, struck out 11 Lions while only surrendering one walk. The outing, Sulser said, felt good, but would mean nothing if the team didn’t clinch the win.
The game dragged in nail-biting suspense until Keller entered the box in the 10th after being intentionally walked in his last at bat. With Parisi on first, Keller slammed a shot into center field out of reach of Lions shortstop Aaron Silbar, driving in the winning run for his team, which stormed the mound to meet him as he ran back from second. The walk off, Keller said, is the first of his Dartmouth career.
“It’s a great feeling,” Keller said. “There’s no better feeling than winning a game and doing it when you’re on offense. That was definitely a high, I think. Looking back, having lost three in a row, it’s not that great, but at the time we felt like it could’ve been something.”
The team wasn’t able to carry that win into the next game, however, despite three home runs, including one from newly positioned clean-up hitter Selzer.
“I don’t think we did quite enough offensively,” Selzer said. “We had two pitchers who threw great. We didn’t score enough runs. In a nine inning game, you should be able to score five runs, so we’re a little frustrated.”
The Big Green scored three in the first, sparked by a leadoff home run from Ruppert, but could not maintain the lead, falling 5-4 despite a ninth-inning rally.
The Big Green started its doubleheader against the University of Pennsylvania on Sunday, going scoreless together for four innings. In the top of the fifth, however, Quaker Michael Vilardo hit a home run to start the scoring for Penn. Penn overtook the scoreless Big Green 4-0, thanks to excellent play from Quaker right-hander Connor Cuff who falls within the top 30 in the NCAA with an ERA of 1.00.
“From my end of it, I just didn’t feel like I was locked in at the plate,” Keller said. “I think a lot of guys feel that way. It doesn’t matter if you’re facing the best pitcher or the worst pitcher, if you can’t hit, the worst pitcher will strike you out.”
Dartmouth’s top of the order took some flesh in the first inning of game two, though, batting in one run on three hits against the scoreless Quakers. The Dartmouth lineup was back at work in the third when dual solo homers by Ruppert and Keller gave Dartmouth a 3-0 lead for the second time this weekend and chased the Penn starter from the game.
However, the Quakers would put up seven runs in the next six innings, keeping Dartmouth, which would go on to score only one more, at bay. The 7-4 victory represents Penn’s 11th win in a row.
Dartmouth’s 2-6 record is enough to keep it in second place in the Red Rolfe Division, but Yale’s three wins put it comfortably in first with a record of 5-3. The two teams will compete in back-to-back doubleheaders in Hanover next weekend. To stay competitive, Dartmouth will have to pull out wins in most, if not all, the games.
“The games are huge,” Keller said. “Any conference game would be huge, but these are huge especially. We’ve got to play better next weekend. We have to win games, and we know that. We have a week to try and get better. Yale’s a team we’ve had an up and down history with. It could go any way, so we’re going to really focus on how we play.”
