DAYTON – The University of Dayton baseball team will open conference play on Friday with the beginning of a four-game series at Davidson. The Flyers will take on the Wildcats at Wilson Field at 6 p.m. on Friday before returning for a doubleheader slated to begin at 1:30 p.m. on Saturday and finishing the series on Sunday with a 1 p.m. first pitch.
 
Friday's game will be available on ESPN+ and all four games will have live stats available for fans to follow along.
 
SCOUTING THE FLYERS
Dayton enters the series with a 10-19 record after falling on Tuesday to Morehead State 10-7 at Woerner Field. Senior Riley Tirotta hit his team-leading seventh home run in the loss and junior Benjamin Blackwell also homered for the Flyers on Tuesday. Graduate student Eddie Pursinger led the team with three hits in the contest, while graduate student Chris Cabrera also had a multi-hit performance. Tirotta was also named both the A-10 Player of the Week as well as the Bobby Bragan Slugger of the Week after going 11-18 last week with a cycle and two home runs.
 
Tirotta currently sits second on the team with a .311 batting average behind Blackwell, whose .327 average leads the flyers. The pair join senior Mariano Ricciardi and junior Marcos Pujols as the only Flyers to start every game for Dayton this year as well as the only four to be hitting over .300 to this point. Tirotta also joins Pursinger and graduate student Alex Brickman as the main producers of the long ball this season, with Pursinger and Brickman each having six home runs to date. The Flyers also find different ways to get on base, as the team leads the A-10 and sits fourth in all of Division I with 56 hit by pitches as a team. Tirotta and senior Mitchell Garrity lead the team with 10 each and Garrity sits first in program history with 53 hit by pitches in his career, which is also good for fourth among active players in Division I.
 
Senior Hunter Wolfe has been the main force on the mound with a 3-2 overall record to lead the team in wins. The lefty leads the A-10 with 56 strikeouts, which also ranks 15^th in Division I. The senior ranks eighth in program history with 181 career strikeouts and sits just three behind Tom Harrison for seventh all-time. Senior Andrew Zapka has been a key contributor out of the bullpen, posting a 0.96 ERA through 9.1 innings this season, while junior Bryce Hellgeth sits second on the team with 30 strikeouts in 18.1 innings while also posting the only save for Dayton this season. As a team, the Flyers rank 17^th in the country with 10.9 strikeouts per nine innings, and first in the A-10 with 290 strikeouts, which also ranks 13^th in DI, and fifth in strikeouts looking with 92.
 
SCOUTING THE WILDCATS
Davidson enters the weekend with a 16-9 record through the team's first 25 games. The Wildcats have won seven games in a row, including a three-game sweep of North Alabama last weekend. The Flyers ended Davidson's season last time the two teams met back in the 2019 A-10 Tournament, with Dayton winning two against the Wildcat. This season, Davidson was picked to finish fourth in the Atlantic 10, one spot behind Dayton.
 
Davidson has done a great job of avoiding double plays this season, and 25 games in the team has grounded into only one double play all year, but the team has turned 16 double plays, which is second in the A-10. Offensively, Alex Fedje-Johnson leads the team with a .326 batting average and has started every game for the Wildcats. Fedje-Johnson also leads the team with 18 walks and 23 runs scored. Five Wildcats, including Fedje-Johnson have hit at least four home runs, alongside John Hosmer, Ruben Fontes, and Trevor Candelaria. While Dayton has done a good job getting on base with the hit by pitch, Davidson's Ryan Wilson leads the conference with 12 hit by pitches to this point in the season.
 
The Wildcats also boast two of the top five pitchers in the A-10 in innings pitched with Gabe Levy and Blake Hely, the first two projected starters in the series with Dayton. The duo also both place in the top six in the conference in strikeouts with Levy at 4th with 41 and Hely in sixth with 37. Hely also places fourth in the A-10 with a 2.59 ERA over 41.2 innings. Nolan Devos has been the mainstay out of the bullpen, leading the conference with 5 saves.
 
PROBABLE STARTERS
Game One: Hunter Wolfe (3-2, 3.16 ERA) vs. Gabe Levy (3-2, 4.81 ERA)
Game Two: Bryce Hellgeth (0-0, 6.38 ERA) vs. Blake Hely (3-1, 2.59 ERA)
Game Three: Cole Pletka (1-2, 6.35 ERA) vs. Jacob Walker (1-1, 4.26 ERA)
Game Four: Anthony Hattrup (0-1, 5.19 ERA) vs. Alex Fenton (1-3, 6.59 ERA)
 
MATCHUP HISTORY
The Flyers own a 7-4 record against Davidson, with the Flyers owning a seven-game winning streak over the Wildcats dating back to May 12, 2016.