Baseball Takes on Dartmouth for Title

Exactly one year ago, a heartbreaking, extra-inning loss to Dartmouth knocked the Harvard baseball team out of the Ivy race, effectively ending a disappointing season.

This weekend, the Crimson looks for more than just revenge. It hopes to regain its familiar place atop the Ivy League.

Harvard can clinch a share of the Red Rolfe crown this weekend by winning at least three games of a home-and-home doubleheader series against Dartmouth. Harvard travels to Hanover tomorrow before returning to O'Donnell Field Sunday.

The Crimson enters this weekend's contest playing its best ball of the season. Harvard has won eight out of its last ten games, including three of four last weekend at Brown.

"Last weekend took us over a hump," said sophomore pitcher Kenon Ronz.

"Everything is finally clicking, and we're becoming a full ball club."

Harvard (17-21, 10-6 Ivy) heads into the final weekend of league play atop the Red Rolfe Division standings, holding a one-game lead over Dartmouth (15-15, 9-7) and a two-game lead over Brown (16-21, 7-7).

The Bears, however, have two games in hand on the rest of the league, due to a postponed doubleheader against Cornell that will be replayed early next week.

A weekend sweep by the Crimson would guarantee Harvard the Rolfe Division title. If Harvard only wins three games, six straight wins by Brown would force a one-game playoff sometime next week, even though the Crimson won the season series between the two teams.

Harvard would be eliminated if it failed to win at least two out of the four games.

The winner of the Red Rolfe Division will take on the Lou Gehrig Division champions-likely Princeton-in a three-game series next weekend. The winner of that series will earn an automatic berth into an NCAA regional bracket.

Ronz said the effects from last year's disappointing season lingered into this year, perhaps contributing to the team's lackluster early-season play.

But he said the Crimson's recent success has enabled the players to finally put last year behind them.

"It's more fun on the team than last year," Ronz said. "Everybody's laughing, everybody's joking. The coaches are letting us mess around, and there's a lot more smiles on the team."

After struggling earlier in the season, Harvard's bats have roared to life, scoring 61 runs in the last five games, including Tuesday's 21-11 demolition of UMass.

Third baseman Nick Carter leads the Harvard offense. The junior is hitting a team-high .370, and he also leads the team with seven home runs. By contrast, no one else on the team bats above .340 or has hit more than four homers.

Despite Harvard's recent power surge, the strength of the team remains its pitching staff, which has remained consistently effective throughout the year.

Dartmouth is the mirror image of the Crimson, relying on powerful hitting to offset some shaky pitching.

Freshman shortstop Scott Shirrell paces the Big Green attack. Shirrell leads Dartmouth in seven offensive categories and sports a gaudy .414 average.

Shirrell also leads Dartmouth in steals with 11. With his combination of speed and power, the shortstop has scored on almost two-thirds of the times he has reached base.

But Dartmouth's offense does not begin and end with Shirrell. The Big Green ranks 18th in the country with a .328 team batting average.

Fortunately, Dartmouth pitchers have been nowhere near as good. Ace Lawrence Fry (3-2, 2.23 ERA) has been very effective, allowing only seven extra-base hits all season. However, every other Dartmouth pitcher has an ERA of at least 2.5 runs higher.

With so much at stake between two closely-matched teams, the series may turn on a wild card factor.

"I think we're warm-weather team," Ronz said. "It seems every time we play in weather that's at least semi-decent, we seem to hit the ball more solidly."

This weekend's weather forecast calls for the temperature to be in the mid-60s. Harvard hopes that will be enough to keep the team on its recent hot streak.