GAME NOTES
DAYTON, Ohio – The University of Dayton Flyers look to extend their four-game winning streak as they welcome the George Washington Colonials, who are unbeaten in Atlantic 10 conference play, to Time Warner Cable Stadium this weekend.
The Flyers are coming off a 22-4 thrashing of Wittenberg on Wednesday. In that game, the Flyers batted through the order on three occasions after both teams combined for 11 runs in the first inning. Freshman Bryce Lahrman earned his second win of the season.
Dayton hopes to get quality action from its starting core of Burny Mitchem, Cameron Hobson and Mike Hauschild as the trio combined to help sweep the Temple Owls last weekend. UD will also turn to its offense, who has combined to outscore the opposition 65-20 in the last four games.
Cole Tyrell leads the Flyers with a .357 average. Tyrell had a triple in his last outing and has had 11 multi-hit games this season, including three of the last four. Brian Blasik has been hitting the ball well and is on a six-game hitting streak. Blasik averages .339 and smacked a home run on Wednesday.
The Colonials, 16-12 this season, but are unbeaten (6-0) in A-10 games thus far. Tom Zebroski is hitting .431 this season, leading the team in doubles (10) and is also third in RBI (26). As a team, GW is hitting .312 and has hit 30 home runs.
Mitchem will square off against right-handed pitcher Ryan LaPointe. LaPointe is 4-2 this season in six starts. He carries a 4.28 ERA and is third on the team with 25 strikeouts. Mitchem had five strikeouts in his last game, but did not earn the win after only tossing 4.1 innings. He leads the team with 45 strikeouts and has a 6.64 ERA.
After pitching a complete-game win last weekend, last year’s A-10 Rookie of the Year Hobson looks to continue working out of an early season rut. Hobson fanned nine while allowing just two earned runs in a 5-2 win over the Owls. The southpaw will face right-handed pitcher Joe Richardson. Richardson has 20 strikeouts and carries an undefeated 5-0 record into the weekend.
Hauschild closes the series for UD. He struck out nine batters while allowing one earned run in seven innings of action. In his last three games he has whittled his ERA from 5.19 to 3.66, which leads all Dayton starters. Hauschild also has the second best strikeout count with 26 this season. He will face GW’s strikeout ace Eric Cantrell. Cantrell also leads his team with a 3.06 ERA and 49 strikeouts. He is 4-1 and opposing batters are hitting just .231 off of him.
First pitch for the series is slated for 3:00 p.m. ET on Friday. Pregame comments from Coach Vittorio will be broadcast as well as UD On Deck starting at 2:30 p.m. on 1660 Information Radio and www.DaytonFlyers.com. Fans are encouraged to bring their used baseball gloves to the stadium for The Good of Gloves, an initiative to collect used ball gloves for underprivileged youth in the Dayton area.
