This weekend, Stanford baseball will welcome Penn State to Sunken Diamond. Games are scheduled for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Friday and Saturday opening pitch set for 2:05 PM PT while Sunday’s opening pitch is set for 1:05 PM PT. All three games will air on Stanford Live Stream and KZSU radio. Stanford comes in at 1-3 overall while Penn State comes in at 3-1 overall.
Last time out: Stanford fell to UNLV at home on Monday by a final score of 10-8.
RECAP: Stanford BSB falls to UNLV on a rainy Monday
Probable pitchers: For Friday, Stanford sophomore righty Matt Scott (0-1, 5.06 ERA) will get the start for the Cardinal while Penn State senior righty Travis Luensmann (0-0, 3.00 ERA) will get the start for the Nittany Lions. For Saturday, Stanford freshman lefty Christian Lim (0-1, 16.20 ERA) will get the start for the Cardinal while Penn State junior righty Frankie Sanchez (1-0, 1.50 ERA) will get the start for the Nittany Lions.
For Sunday, the starters for both teams is TBA though if I had to guess, Stanford will roll with sophomore righty Nick Dugan (1-0, 1.69 ERA). I would be surprised if they go with someone different, but I guess we’ll see.
On Penn State: The Nittany Lions are off to a strong start this season going 3-1 against Army and Monmouth last weekend in Cary, North Carolina. Not the strongest of competition, but still credit to them for winning the weekend. They were not projected to make the top six of the Big Ten this season, which is all their preseason poll reveals. So, it’s a bit hard to know how good they’re supposed to be from that beyond the fact that they aren’t expected to compete for a league title this year. But if last year is any indicator, they went 25-25 overall with a 7-16 record in the Big Ten.
The top contact hitter for the Nittany Lions is junior catcher Matt Maloney, who is batting .625 for one home run, 11 RBIs, a 1.000 slugging percentage and a .667 on base percentage. The top power hitter is senior outfielder Tayven Kelley, who is batting .250 for two home runs, five RBIs, a .750 slugging percentage, and a .250 on base percentage. One other batter to mention is junior infielder Joe Jaconski, who is batting .600 for a .600 slugging percentage and a .692 on base percentage. Jaconski doesn’t yet have an RBI this season, which is odd. That soon will change though if he keeps hitting like he is.
Keys to the series: For Stanford, the first thing they need is to get a strong performance from Matt Scott. He’s the Friday night guy and needs to set the tone for the series. He didn’t have a bad outing last week against Fullerton, but it could have been better. If he has a bounce back outing, that would be huge.
The second thing Stanford needs to do is give Malcolm Moore opportunities to make the most of his power. If Moore can get going and do so with guys on base, that would help a ton. He’s the best power hitter on the team and if he’s able to go to the plate with guys on base, that’s gonna force teams to pitch to him. If he’s batting with no one on base, it’s gonna be tough for him to do his thing.
Finally, Stanford’s bullpen needs to come through. There’s gonna be some jams that they’re likely gonna have to get out of. How they handle those moments will likely determine the outcome of the series.
Prediction: Even though Penn State is off to a better start to the season, I’m still gonna roll with Stanford to take two out of three this weekend. Penn State isn’t a great team and the competition they beat last week wasn’t all that impressive. I think having homefield will help Stanford out and I think they’ll settle in a bit more this weekend. It also helps that Stanford’s bats came alive in that final inning against UNLV even though they didn't complete the comeback.
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