Bulldogs, Knights meet in NEC series

BASEBALL VISITS FDU FOR FOUR-GAME SERIES

GAME NOTES

SMITHFIELD, R.I. – Coming off a dominant victory over Boston College on Wednesday, the Bryant University baseball team returns to Northeast Conference play this weekend with a four-game series in Hackensack, N.J., against Fairleigh Dickinson.

The Bulldogs (10-9-1, 4-0 NEC) have won five-straight games and will take on a Knights (3-13, 0-4) team that has lost 12 of their last 13 games. The teams will play a pair of doubleheaders on Friday and Saturday, with the twinbills beginning at 12:00 p.m. on each day. Friday will feature a nine-inning game followed by a seven-inning game, and Saturday will feature a seven-inning game followed by a nine-inning game.

Bryant has dominated the all-time series between the two schools, 10-2. The teams first met in 2010 and the Bulldogs swept FDU each of the first two seasons. Last season, the Knights came to Smithfield and earned a weekend split with the Black and Gold, sweeping a doubleheader from the Bulldogs on Saturday.

An NEC tournament qualifier a year ago, the Knights have struggled to replace the loss of 2012 NEC Player of the Year Ryan Kresky. They are hitting just .253 as a team and their team ERA is 7.62. Kyle Weeks is hitting a team-high .357 with a team-high six doubles. Big first baseman Eric Anderson has homered and driven in 11 runs on the year. Sophomore Riley Moonan leads the team with 13 runs scored.

On the mound, the Knights will start the series with Craig Warner on Friday. Warner is 0-3 with a 7.17 ERA over 21.1 innings. Brendan Butler (1-3, 7.64) and Joe Borelli (0-4, 9.19) will throw the middle two games of the series and Nick Cuono will throw the final game. Cuono has been the top pitcher for the Knights this season, posting a 2-1 record and a 5.82 ERA over a team-leading 21.2 innings.

The Bulldogs are coming off one of their best offensive showings of the season on Wednesday against Boston College. Bryant scored a season-high 13 runs on 13 hits to defeat the Eagles for the first time since 2009. Senior Kevin Brown (Northborough, Mass.) led the offense with three hits and four RBI, finishing a double shy of the cycle. He enters the weekend one double and one triple shy of tying the all-time record in each category. Freshman AJ Zarozny (Shrewsbury, Mass.) has also made an immediate impact on the lineup since his return from a preseason injury. He collected three hits, drove in two runs and scored four runs against the Eagles on Wednesday. In four games, he's hitting .467 with a .667 slugging and a .556 on-base percentage.

Bryant will roll out the same four starters it did a week ago when it allowed just three earned runs to Mount St. Mary's. Senior Peter Kelich (Jackson, N.J.) will start the opener in search of his program record-tying 26 victory. He's 2-2 on the year with a 2.12 ERA in 29.2 innings. Sophomore Kevin McAvoy (Syracuse, N.Y.) will start game two, graduate student John Healy (Cranston, R.I.) game three and junior Craig Schlitter (Guilford, Conn.) game four. McAvoy struck out a career-high seven batters last weekend to earn his first win of the year, Healy struck out 10 to move to 3-0 and Schlitter didn't walk a batter and struck out five, moving himself into fourth-place nationally with a 13.5:1 strikeout-to-walk ratio.

Following the weekend series, the Bulldogs make the quick trip down to Providence to face Brown on Wednesday, April 3.