AMCC Baseball Game of the Week:
Penn St. Altoona @ Penn St. Behrend
Sunday, April 21 at 1:00 & 4:00 p.m.
***Rescheduled from original date***
The AMCC Baseball Game of the Week features two teams battling it out for prime postseason seedings, as Penn State Altoona travels to Penn State Behrend on Saturday afternoon. Behrend picked up two big wins from Pitt-Bradford on Thursday afternoon to jump Altoona in the standings, as they currently sit in third place with a 7-3 conference mark. With Behrend's two wins on Thursday, Altoona slipped down a spot to fourth place with an 8-4 conference record.
After getting its season off to a slow start, Penn State Altoona (19-12, 8-4 AMCC) has gone 19-6 in its last 25 games. The Lions’ bats have been heating up as of late, and the team has also gotten some strong pitching performances. As a team, Penn State Altoona is second in the AMCC in on-base percentage (.414) and home runs (19) while ranking third in runs scored (230), hits (272), RBI (201), stolen bases (46), total bases (389), batting average (.299), and slugging percentage (.427). Junior first baseman Catcher Cumming, recently named to the D3baseball.com Team of the Week, is tied for second in the AMCC in RBI with 32. Junior outfielder Chase Clouser shares the conference lead in home runs with six. On the mound, junior right-handed pitcher Aaron Sharp is third in the conference in strikeouts per nine (8.69), and fellow junior righty Zane Leister is 4-0 while sitting at 12th in the AMCC in earned run average (3.52).
Penn State Behrend (18-9, 7-3 AMCC) earned the big sweep over the Pitt-Bradford Panthers Thursday afternoon to take over third place in the standings. The Lions tallied 13 hits and scored a run in every inning to win in convincing fashion. Ryan Weaver was a perfect 3-for-3 with two RBIs and a stolen base. Scott Sada, who is on a 21-game hitting streak, made both hits doubles to add to his collection and inching closer to the NCAA Division I record. Starter Thomas Zbezinski threw his third complete game to collect his fifth win. Zbezinski allowed two earned runs and struck out six. Sada is currently ranked first in NCAA Division III statistics in doubles per game (.70) and is fifth with 16 doubles. Sada now has 86 career doubles as he recently the NCAA Division III record and is now 10 away from reaching the all-time record (Division I) set at 95 with 13 games left to play in the regular season. Additionally, senior hurler Phil Myers reached 150 career strikeouts by fanning four batters in game two against the Panthers.
Behrend and Penn State Altoona have been battling since 1999. The Behrend Lions hold a 31-19 lead in the all-time series, as Behrend has won 12 of the last 15. Last season, the teams split during the regular season before Behrend posted a 9-4 victory in the AMCC semifinals.