Game 37 • Princeton at Cornell
First Pitch: Wednesday, April 29, at 1 p.m.
Site: David F. Hoy Field • Ithaca, N.Y.

The Basics
2009 Records:
    Cornell: 15-21, 10-10 Ivy League
    Princeton: 18-18, 10-10 Ivy League
Series Record: Princeton leads, 131-80-2
Season Series: Tied, 2-2

Media Information
Television: none
Radio: none
Live Video: Cornell Redcast
Live Stats: CornellBigRed.com

Game Notes In PDF Format

ITHACA, N.Y. -- After reaching the end of the 2009 Ivy League baseball regular season with identical 10-10 records, Cornell and Princeton will square off in a single, nine-inning game at 1 p.m. on Wednesday at Hoy Field in Ithaca to determine which team will advance to the Ivy League championship series against Dartmouth. Cornell and Princeton split the season series, two wins apiece, with the Big Red claiming the nine-inning game of both doubleheaders against the Tigers last weekend. Live streaming video of Wednesday's game will be available through the Cornell Redcast subscription service, while fans can also follow along through live stats.

HOW WE GOT HERE
Princeton and Cornell posted identical 10-10 records in the Ivy League this season, with both teams also posting an 8-4 mark in the Ivy League Gehrig Division. The two sides also went 3-1 against both Columbia and Penn in the division, and dropped both of their games against Rolfe Division winner Dartmouth. Cornell picked up a split against Rolfe Division runner-up Brown, while Princeton was swept by the Bears, giving the Big Red the all-important hosting rights for Wednesday's playoff game.

THE HEAD COACH
In his first season as the Ted Thoren Head Coach of Baseball at Cornell University, Bill Walkenbach has guided the Big Red to a share of its first division title since 2005. Named head coach on Aug. 14, 2008, Walkenbach is in his second stint as a coach for the Big Red, having previously served as an assistant coach under current associate head coach Tom Ford from 2003-05. He returned to Cornell after spending three seasons as the head coach at Franklin & Marshall, guiding the Diplomats to an NCAA tournament berth in 2006 and a 69-42 record. Now in his fourth season as a collegiate head coach, Walkenbach has a career record of 84-63 (.571).

ABOUT THE BIG RED
Cornell enters Wednesday's playoff game with a 15-21 record overall, hitting .293 as a team and posting a combined earned run average of 5.92. Freshman Brian Billigen leads the team with a .394 average, while Nathan Ford (.371), Scott Hardinger (.317), Matt Langseth (.304) and Mickey Brodsky (.301) are also batting better than .300 for the season. Brodsky and Ford lead the team with 33 runs batted in apiece, while Hardinger has scored a team-best 28 runs. Ford has belted a team-high eight home runs, with Nate David and Jadd Schmeltzer both tied for second with five long balls apiece. On the mound, Schmeltzer has a 3.65 earned-run average to lead Big Red starters, while David Rochefort leads the staff with his 2.86 earned-run average out of the bullpen. Six different players have picked up a pair of wins this season, while Rochefort has seven saves as the team's closer. Matt Hill has fanned a team-best 36 batters, with Schmeltzer striking out 32 and Rochefort having struck out 29 opponents.

ABOUT PRINCETON
Princeton leads the Ivy League in team earned-run average, as the Tigers have combined for a 4.94 ERA this season. As a team, the Tigers are batting .282, led by Dan DeGeorge's .351 average. Joining DeGeorge in batting at or above .300 on the year are Greg Van Horn (.314) and Derek Beckman (.300). DeGeorge has scored a team-best 26 runs, while Jack Murphy has driven in 27 runs on the year. Brian Berkowitz has a team-high five home runs this season. On the mound, David Palms leads Tiger starters with a 3.21 earned-run average, with Brad Gemberling having thrown a team-high 54.2 innings of work. Palms and Gemberling both have five wins on the year to share the team lead, while Gemberling has struck out a team-high 72 batters. Matt Grabowski has a 2.87 earned-run average out of the bullpen with a team-best five saves.

AND THE AWARD GOES TO...
Junior Nate David and sophomore Corey Pappel were recognized as the Ivy League co-player and co-pitcher of the week, respectively, when the most recent awards were announced on Tuesday. David batted .533 last week, getting a hit in five of the Big Red's six games, including a grand slam in his only at-bat against Siena and a 3-for-3 performance in game two on Friday against Princeton. Pappel, meanwhile, threw eight innings of three-hit ball on Friday in the Big Red's 4-1 victory in game two over the Tigers. He struck out nine and walked three in the contest, retiring Princeton in order in four of the eight innings he worked.

UNCHARTED TERRITORY
Princeton definitely has the edge in terms of all-time playoff experience, as the Big Red has claimed just its second divisional title since the Ivy League went to divisional play before 1993. The Big Red has only won a league championship or a divisional title just seven times since first playing baseball in 1869. Cornell's league championships came in 1939, 1940, 1943, 1952 and 1977 in the EIBL and the 2005 Gehrig Division title in the Ivy League. Still, Cornell's coaches have post-season experience, as all three of Bill Walkenbach, Tom Ford and Scott Marsh were on the coaching staff in 2005 - only then, it was Walkenbach and Marsh assisting Ford, instead of this season's edition of Ford and Marsh helping Walkenbach.

PLAYOFF HISTORY
Since the Ivy League went to divisional play before the 1993 season, the league has needed to go to the one-game playoff four times, twice each in the Gehrig Division and the Rolfe Division. Interestingly enough, Princeton has been involved in all four occurrences, as the Tigers were the Gehrig Division winner in the two seasons that the Rolfe Division went to a playoff. Princeton was victorious in both of the two playoffs it has been involved in, defeating Penn in both 1996 and 1997 to advance to the league championship series. Most recently, the playoff was needed in 2001 and 2002. In 2001, Dartmouth won the single-game tiebreaker over Brown, only to lose the championship series to Princeton, while in 2002, it was Harvard that was victorious over the Bears before going on to win the championship series in two games. Of the four times the playoff has been used, the playoff winner has won the league championship series twice, in both 1996 and 2002.

SAVING THE DAY
Cornell closer David Rochefort picked up the save in game two of the doubleheader against the Tigers on April 24, giving him seven for the season and setting a new school record. Rochefort broke the old mark of six, set by David Sharfstein from 2002, and moved into a tie with Sharfstein for second on the all-time career list with seven. John Douglas holds the career mark of nine from 1985-88.

IN THE SWING OF THINGS
Cornell's team batting average of .293 is currently the seventh-highest batting average in program history. Collectively, the Big Red has batted better than .300 just five times in its history. The current .293 average is the highest the BIg Red has hit as a team since the 1991 season, when Cornell batted .306.

GO LONG
Cornell players have combined to hit 31 home runs this season, good for third all-time in program history. Led by eight from Nathan Ford, the Big Red trails the school record of 35, set in 1999, and the second-highest mark of 34, set in 2001. Nine different players have hit at least one home run this season.

START ME UP
Since freshman Brian Billigen took over the leadoff spot in the batting order on April 4 at Harvard, the Big Red has turned its season around, going 11-9 in the 20 ensuing games. Prior to Billigen's insertion at the top of the order, Cornell was just 4-12. Additionally, the team is batting .317, with each of the top four batters in the lineup batting well over .300 . In the first 16 games, only two batters - Nathan Ford and Nate David - were over the .300 mark as Cornell hit just .262 as a team.

SWING AND A MISS
Cornell pitchers have combined to strike out 208 opposing batters this season, putting together nearly a 2-to-1 strikeout-to-walk ratio. David Rochefort has struck out 29 batters while walking just four, while Mickey Brodsky has 18 strikeouts to five walks this season. Among regular pitchers for the Big Red, all have struck out more batters than they have walked.

GOING STREAKING
Nathan Ford holds the longest hitting streak of the year for the Big Red, getting a base hit in 14 straight games from March 28 against Brown to April 18 at Columbia. Senior Adam Jacobs holds the longest active hitting streak at nine games, raising his batting average from .192 to its current mark of .248 in the process.

BALANCED OFFENSE
In picking up a split against Princeton last weekend, the Big Red got contributions from all parts of the batting order. Eight different players contributed to the 15 runs scored, with Frank Hager, Domenic Di Ricco and Mickey Brodsky touching home three times each. Similarly, seven players had at least one RBI on the weekend, led by Adam Jacobs and Di Ricco with three apiece.

MAKING THEIR PITCH
Wednesday's playoff game will pit the top two pitching staffs in the Ivy League, as the Tigers lead the league with a 4.94 earned-run average and Cornell is ranked second with its 5.92 ERA. Cornell has actually allowed the fewest hits of any team in the Ivy League, surrendering 20 fewer than second-place Princeton.

AVOIDING THE GOOSE-EGG
When Cornell was shut out, 2-0, to open the four-game set against Princeton on April 24, it marked just the second time this season, and the first against Ivy League competition, that the Big Red had been blanked. By contrast, Princeton has been shut out four times this year, including once against Columbia and once against Penn. Cornell has one shutout win this year, a 7-0 win over Navy to open the year, while Princeton has blanked its opponent three times, including once against Navy, once against Penn, and the game one win against Cornell on April 24.

UP NEXT
The winner of Wednesday's playoff game will travel to Dartmouth to face the Big Green in a best-of-three series this weekend in Hanover, N.H. Game one will begin at 12 p.m. at Red Rolfe Field at Biondi Park on Saturday. Game two will start 30 minutes after the conclusion of game one, and game three, if necessary, would begin at 1 p.m. on Sunday.