D3baseball.com Daily Dose

TWINE Notes #2 March 11th 2008

Looking back at Week #2–March 3rd to March 9th

Games of the Week

Eastern Connecticut vs Kean–Kean picks up the victory behind a strong pitching performance from Joe Bartlinski (7IP, 5H, 2ER, 13K, 2BB). Eastern had 5 errors which cost them, it should be noted that this was there first game and they have made only 3 errors in the next two games. This was a good win for Kean (after being swept by Manhattanville) but no need to worry for Eastern.

Wheaton vs Cortland State–Josh Simmons started his transition to a starter (21 appearances in 2007—all in relief) with a loss against Cortland State. A game where the two teams combined for 8 errors. Last week I mentioned that Wheaton, Cortland, and TCNJ would all be playing each other twice. Once through the rotation TCNJ is 2-0 and 5-0 overall. Cortland is 1-1 while Wheaton is 0-2

Toughest Week
WPI—St. Joe’s Maine (W 3-0 & L 10-7), Muskingum (W 5-4, L 14-7), Northland (W 9-1, W 12-6), Lewis (L 9-3), Misericordia (L 13-12), Thomas More (W 10-4), & Albion (L 4-3, W 9-6). The Engineers return to Worcester with a respectable 6-5 record. Staff ace Conor Fahey lead the staff with a 2-0 record (wins over St. Joe’s Maine and Thomas More). Fahey pitched 16 inning with a 1.69 ERA.

Looking Forward to Week 2–March 10th to March 16th

Games of the week

Many more games to choose from as many more teams are in action this week.

GNAC—Sunday March 16th, Suffolk vs Montclair State—If a GNAC team can score a victory against a top NJAC team they should be very happy.

LEC—Saturday March 15th, Keene State vs TCNJ (DH)—TCNJ is rolling (5-0) and will be taking on a Keene State squad fresh of the airplane from New Hampshire. Although the Owls would love a sweep, a split here has to be a good sign going forward.

MASCAC—Saturday March 15th, MCLA vs Rowan—MCLA seems like a team ready to break out in the MASCAC. They will be tested by a Rowan squad that already has a win against Cortland State and a double header sweep of MCLA’s conference rival Worcester State.

NAC—Wednesday March 12th, Elms vs Curry (DH)—A good test early for Elms. Curry returns a solid core that won the TCCC last year.

NESCAC—Friday March 14th, Tufts vs Lynchburg—Tufts breaks the mold of the teams going to Arizona or Florida and heads to Virginia to match up against Lynchburg. This will be a good test for the Jumbos as this will be their first game and it will be Lynchburg’s 19th.

NEWMAC—Saturday March 15th, Babson vs Amherst—Many felt that Babson had an argument to get an at large bid last year. That bid may have gone to Trinity, a victory against another NESCAC team may help the Beavers if they are in a similar situation in 2008.

TCCC—Sunday March 16th, WNEC vs Wheaton—These two teams split a pair of one run decisions last May in Norton, MA. This year they meet a few months earlier and 2,699 miles away (Yes, I did take the time to see how far apart Phoenix and Norton are, it is 2,699)

Toughest Week
Wheaton (including their entire Arizona Trip)—The choice for toughest week this week was not difficult. Wheaton is playing 10 games in Arizona and 8 of those games will be played against teams that participated in the NCAA tournament last year. Also their opponents averaged 31 wins last year. The schedule breaks down as below…

Saturday—TCNJ L 12-4
Sunday—Cortland State L 8-4
Monday—Monmouth W 13-6
Tuesday—Cortland State L 9-5 and Webster W 7-6
Thursday—TCNJ
Friday—Hope
Saturday—Montclair State
Sunday—John’s Hopkins & WNEC

The Lyons are off to a 2-3 start but it should be noted that they started 1-4 in 2007 and received the #1 seed the New England Regional.

Sorry for the delay in getting this up. I checked out two games between Brockport State and Kean on Sunday on a cold and windy early March day in New Jersey and my fingers just thawed out enough to type.