ITHACA, N.Y. — The baseball team will kick off the home portion of its schedule Tuesday afternoon at Hoy Field, when the Big Red plays host to Albany for a non-league doubleheader. Cornell (11-5) has won seven consecutive games coming into its first games at Hoy Field since it won the 2012 Ivy League Championship.
 
GAME INFORMATION
Albany at Cornell
SITE: Hoy Field — Ithaca, N.Y.
2013 RECORDS: Albany 6-10 (3-3 America East); Cornell 11-5 (0-0 Ivy League)
SERIES RECORD: Cornell leads, 1-0-1
LAST MEETING: Cornell won a doubleheader on March 27, 2012 (5-2 W, 3-3 T)
LIVE STATS: http://sidearmstats.com/cornell/baseball/scoreboard.aspx
AUDIO: www.ustream.tv/channel/cornellatbat
GAME 1: 2 p.m. on Tuesday, March 26, 2013
GAME 2: Approximately 30 minutes following the completion of the first game.
 
ABOUT THE BIG RED
After falling below .500 for the first time since 2011, Cornell has responded with a seven-game winning streak, highlighted by series sweeps of Davidson and Villanova. Junior SS Tom D'Alessandro has been the team's leading hitter over the streak, batting .385 with a team-high nine runs, 10 hits, six walks and a slugging percentage of .615. He also hit his first home run of the season. … Sophomore C Matt Hall leads the team with a .308 average and is tied with D'Alessandro for second on the team with 11 RBIs, three behind junior 1B Ryan Plantier. … Sophomore OF Kevin Tatum has a team-high two homers and 15 walks. Both of his home runs and all five of his RBIs came in the same game — a 10-9 win Tuesday at Davidson. … The Big Red pitching staff was lights-out at Villanova, surrendering just three runs in the three-game set. Sophomore RHP Brian McAfee, an All-Ivy League Second Team  selection last season, tossed six scoreless innings in a 4-0 win on Saturday, then sophomore RHP Brent Jones improved to 3-0 on the season as the pitcher of record in a 3-1 triumph in the series finale.
 
THE HEAD COACH
In his fifth season as the Ted Thoren Head Coach of Baseball at Cornell University, Bill Walkenbach has brought the Big Red into the spotlight with the program's first league title since 1977 and its first Ivy League title since the circuit added baseball 20 years ago. 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 eighth season as a collegiate head coach, Walkenbach has a career record of 156-134-1 (.538).
 
ABOUT ALBANY
The Great Danes are 6-10 overall and have evened their America East record at 3-3 after taking two of three from Maryland-Baltimore County over the weekend. The team returns eight position starters from a squad that finished second in the America East regular-season standings in 2012. … Freshman C Evan Harasta leads regular players with a .342 average, while senior OF Nolan Gaige and senior IF/OF Jeff Welsh are both batting .311. Gaige and junior UTL Josh Nethaway both have a team-high one home run, seven total extra-base hits and 13 RBI. Gaige was named the America East Player of the Week on Monday after hitting .500 with three triples last weekend. … Senior RHPs Kasceim Graham (3-2, 3.25) and Derek Zielinski (1-3, 6.43) have been the team's primary starters to date, though sophomore RHP Cameron Sorgie (1-1, 3.90) and freshman RHP Ryan Stinar (1-0, 4.15) started games against UMBC. Senior RHP Austin Chase (0-3, 9.42), who has started three games, surrendered one run while working into extra innings against the Big Red last season before surrendering three more in the ninth to take the loss.
 
SERIES HISTORY WITH ALBANY
Cornell is 1-0-1 all-time against the Great Danes, with both games coming on March 27, 2012. The Big Red had just two hits in the regulation seven innings in the first game, but then erupted for four runs in the top of the ninth to power a 5-2 victory in the opener. Junior SS Tom D'Alessandro had a two-run single in the frame, driving in the eventual winning run. The extra time it took to play the first game then cut the second game short after darkness forced a suspension of play with the score tied at 3 after six innings. It was the first Cornell tie since 2003, and the first in the head coaching career of Bill Walkenbach.
 
AN HONORABLE POSITION
Sophomore JD Whetsel was named The Ivy League's Player of the Week on March 19. He had a breakthrough weekend offensively, helping Cornell to a pair of victories in a three-game series against 2012 NCAA Regional finalist Appalachian State. He was 6-for-11 with seven runs, a pair of extra-base hits, three walks and three stolen bases. One of those extra-base hits was a three-run home run — the first of his collegiate career. Whetsel became the first Big Red player to earn the award since the player he replaced as the starting center fielder, Brian Billigen '12, won the honor on March 2, 2012.
 
MORE THAN A LITTLE HISTORY
Cornell is coming off a 2012 season which was filled with dramatic victories, marked by a perfect 5-0 mark in extra-inning affairs. The Big Red went 31-17-1 to set a program record for victories, win the Ivy League title and advance to the NCAA Regionals. It was an extraordinary turnaround in just a year's time after the Big Red posted a 10-30 record in 2011. The team's 14-6 record in Ivy League play was also a program high in either the Ivy League or Eastern Intercollegiate Baseball League. Not surprisingly, Cornell mopped up with 11 All-Ivy selections, including a pair of first-team pitchers in Connor Kaufmann, who returns for his junior season, and Kellen Urbon, who returns as a sophomore.
 
UNHITTABLE
Sophomore RHP Connor Kaufmann tossed the program's first no-hitter in nearly 32 years on April 1, 2012 against Dartmouth. He needed just 80 pitches to mow down the Big Green for seven innings on a day in which the mound was under constant repair due to a steady rain. Kaufmann faced the minimum 21 batters, retiring the final 16 consecutively after walks in the first and second innings. No runner advance past first base. The last solo no-hitter for Cornell was April 8, 1979, when Greg Myers worked five innings in a 1-0 victory over Canisius. Kaufmann went on to be selected as an All-Ivy League First Team selection.
 
URBON LEGEND
Sophomore RHP Kellen Urbon made quite a statement in his 21 appearances last season. He set a program record with nine saves, and his miniscule 0.47 earned-run average was the lowest ever recorded by a Cornell pitcher who has seen more than 30 innings of action. Not surprisingly, he has reeled in countless awards and honors as a result. Urbon was a unanimous selection as a first-team relief pitcher and was also named the Ivy League Rookie of the Year — the first time a Cornellian has taken the award since head coach Bill Walkenbach did it himself in 1995. He was also a Louisville Slugger Freshman All-American and a National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association's Preseason All-America Third Team selection in December.
 
CONTROL FREAK
Sophomore RHP Brian McAfee has 16 strikeouts compared to just two walks over his first four starts, which puts him among some of the nation's stingiest pitchers when it comes to issuing free passes. As of March 17, McAfee ranked ninth among NCAA Division I pitchers in walks allowed per nine innings (0.54) and 21st in strikeout-to-walk ratio (9.0). While it's a small sample size for this season, this trend is nothing new for McAfee. An All-Ivy League Second Team selection as a freshman last season, he posted a 6-1 record and had a 41:10 strikeout-to-walk ratio. His average of 1.35 walks per nine innings ranked 35th in the nation.
 
CRUZ CONTROL
Junior OF Chris Cruz set a single-season program record for home runs in 2012, bashing 12 — the last one coming in walk-off fashion in decisive Game 3 of the Ivy League Championship Series. His historic run actually started at UMES, when he smacked two home runs in the first game against the Hawks. He led the Ivy League in home runs last season, and his average of 0.24 home runs per game ranked 35th in the country.
 
UP NEXT
Cornell continues its eight-game homestand when it begins Ivy League play over the weekend. The Big Red will play two games against Brown on Saturday, then two more games against Yale on Sunday. First pitch is scheduled for noon in both twinbills, then Cornell will wrap up the homestand with a non-league doubleheader against Canisius at 2 p.m. on Wednesday, April 3.