DAYTON – The University of Dayton baseball team will finish out the home portion of the schedule with a three-game series against Richmond over the weekend. The Flyers will open on Friday night at 7 p.m. at Day Air Ballpark, home of the Dayton Dragons. Dayton will continue the series on Saturday afternoon at 1 p.m. at Woerner Field at AES Ohio Stadium and finish the weekend Sunday at noon.
 
All three games will feature live stats and a live radio broadcast courtesy of Gem City Sports, and Saturday's contest will also be streamed on ESPN+.
 
SCOUTING THE FLYERS
The Flyers enter the weekend at 20-24 after taking down Purdue Fort Wayne in the team's final midweek game of the season on Tuesday. Dayton won 8-5 behind two home runs from graduate student Henry Strmecki.
 
The Flyers currently sit tied for ninth in the Atlantic 10 standings with six games left to play in the schedule. Dayton is 7-11 through the first 18 games, tied with UMass and one game behind Richmond and George Washington for the seventh and final spot in the Atlantic 10 Championship.
 
Strmecki leads the team offensively with a .304 batting average this season. He sits second on the Flyers with eight home runs and nine doubles to go with his 26 RBIs in 2022. Junior Keagan Calero is hitting .294 with a team-high 34 runs scored in 41 games for Dayton to go with eight doubles and three home runs.
 
Seniors Marcos Pujols and Jay Curtis have been the main run producers for Dayton, driving in 37 and 34 runs, respectively, this season. Pujols also leads the team with 10 home runs and now has 27 career homers, two behind Aaron Reesh and Brent Berigan for the fifth most in a career by a Flyer.
 
Junior Mark Manfredi has started eight games this season for the Flyers, posting a 3.57 ERA in 12 appearances. The junior has 57 strikeouts, the second most on the team and has six quality starts in his last seven outings. Graduate student Kenny Serwa has performed well at Day Air Ballpark this season, and will look to continue that trend on Friday night. Serwa pitched seven scoreless innings and struck out 11 on April 12 against Ohio State at the home of the Dragons.
 
Graduate student Nick Meyer recorded the save against the Mastodons on Tuesday and has been the team's most consistent bullpen arm, striking out 26 in 18.2 innings. Meyer is sporting a 1.45 ERA this season and has a 2-1 record in 14 appearances in 2022.
 
The pitching staff has 391 strikeouts this season, the fourth most in program history. This year's team is 38 strikeouts behind the 2011 team for third place, who finished with 429 strikeouts 11 years ago.
 
SCOUTING THE SPIDERS
Richmond enters the weekend at 23-21 overall and 8-10 in Atlantic 10 play. The Spiders fell during their midweek game against Towson, but took two of three from George Mason over the weekend.
 
The team was picked to finish eighth in the Atlantic 10 Preseason Poll at the beginning of the season, right behind George Washington, who the Spiders are currently tied with for the last spot in the Atlantic 10 Championship.
 
Tracy Woodson enters his ninth season as the coach of the Spiders, picking up 183 wins during his first eight seasons in Richmond.
 
Richmond is ranked 20^th in Division I with a .305 batting average as a team this season. Dominic Toso ranks third in the Atlantic 10 and leads the team with a .412 average in 2022. The redshirt senior has added seven home runs and a team-leading 50 RBIs for the Spiders. Alden Mathes ranks second on the team, hitting .361. He leads the team with eight home runs and seven stolen bases.
 
Brock Weirather and Jeremy Neff have been the two consistencies in the Richmond rotation this season. Weirather is 6-3 in 2022 with a 4.87 ERA. In 68.1 innings, the graduate student has struck out 55 batters and has one complete game, tossing a complete game shutout against VCU on April 15.
 
Neff ranks fifth in the conference with 65 strikeouts this season in 63 innings. In 13 starts, he has a 5.57 ERA and a 2-5 record for the Spiders.
 
MATCHUP HISTORY
Friday's game will mark the 50^th matchup between the two schools since 2002, with Dayton holding a 28-21 record against the Spiders over that span. The Flyers swept a four-game series against Richmond last season on the road from May 7-9. In the series finale, Dayton won 20-10 behind two home runs and seven RBIs from Marcos Pujols. The Flyers hit six home runs in that contest, with two from Mitchell Garrity and one from Eddie Pursinger and Jay Curtis.