ITHACA, N.Y. — The Cornell baseball team returns to Hoy Field for the first of two consecutive home Ivy League series when it welcomes Princeton to Ithaca for a three-game series.
 

SERIES INFORMATION

Princeton at Cornell
SITE: Hoy Field — Ithaca, N.Y.
RECORDS: Cornell 8-19, 3-9 Ivy League;
                    Princeton 7-21; 4-8 Ivy League
SERIES RECORD: Princeton leads, 150-98-2
VIDEO: ESPN+ | Game 1 | Game 2 | Game 3
STATS: CornellBigRed.com
- - - - - - - - -
Probable starters
Game 1 • 11:30 a.m. Saturday, April 20
   Cornell (Wyatt, RHP, 2-4, 3.11)   •   Princeton (Smith, LHP, 2-3, 4.06)
Game 2 • ~2:30 p.m. Saturday, April 20
   Cornell (Ellison, RHP, 0-0, 1.65)   •   Princeton (Proctor, RHP, 1-4, 3.72)
Game 3 • Noon Sunday, April 21
   Cornell (Bemiss, RHP, 2-1, 5.68)   •   Princeton (Gnazzo, RHP, 3-4, 5.19)

Cornell game notes (PDF)
 

Harvard Series Redux:

•   Cornell took one of three games last weekend in its series at O'Donnell Field against Harvard, which was tied for first place in the Ivy League until the Big Red's 2-0 victory in Sunday's finale.
•   Making his first weekend start since February, Jeb Bemiss surrendered just one soft hit while striking out eight in 7.2 innings of work before John Natoli struck out all four batters he faced in a 2-0 shutout. It was Natoli's fourth save of the season.
•   Both teams came out swinging in breezy conditions against the staff aces in Saturday's first game, with 12 of the 14 runs coming in the first four innings. Ramon Garza was 3-for-4 with his first home run of the season, and Austin Flematti and Alex Carnegie drove in two runs apiece in the Big Red's 8-6 loss.
•   Adam Saks led off Saturday's night cap with his first collegiate home run, but that's all Cornell could muster offensively. Buddy Hayward tossed a five-hit complete game and Jake Suddleson broke the game open with a three-run homer in the eighth inning for the Crimson in a 7-1 win.
 

The Big Red, In Brief:

•   Dan Pepicelli is in his fourth season as the Ted Thoren Head Coach of Baseball. He has a 57-82-1 record at the helm.
•   Pitching continues to be the Big Red's strength this season. Cornell ranks second in the Ivy League with a 4.78 earned run average, and it leads the league in team shutouts (three), strikeout-to-walk ratio (2.24) and WHIP (1.42)
•   This season marks the 150th year of baseball at Cornell, as it continues to be the oldest varsity sport at the university. A celebration commemorating the program's sesquicentennial will be held on Saturday, April 27 at Hoy Field during the Big Red's home series against Penn.
 

On Offense:

•   Cornell's bats are continuing their upward trend, having now averaged 8.64 hits per game over the last 14 contests after averaging just 4.85 over its first 13 games. Over the last 14, the team is batting .260 with 27 doubles, and it has six players batting .275 or better.
•   Senior Adam Saks boasts a .309 average, having taken over the everyday role in center field while primarily batting leadoff. After spending his first three years on East Hill exclusively deployed as a pitcher, Saks has reached base safely in all 15 of his starts.
•   Another converted pitcher is patrolling the outfield in sophomore Nicholas Binnie, who owns a .250 batting average.
•   Senior Will Simoneit leads the team's qualifying batters with a .255 average and two of the team's six home runs. He topped .300 in each of the last two seasons.
•   Freshman Austin Flematti leads the team with 12 RBI, followed by 10 apiece from senior Josh Arndt and junior Alex Carnegie.
•   Sophomore Ramon Garza (.250) has a team-high seven doubles and hit his first home run of the season last Saturday at Harvard. He's a perfect 6-for-6 on stolen-base attempts, which ranks second on the team to junior Matt Collins (8-for-8).
 

On The Mound:

•   Junior Colby Wyatt (2-4, 3.11) is looking to shake off a few tough starts after having yielded just four runs (three earned) across his first five starts. He has transitioned to the rotation after leading the Big Red in relief appearances last season.
•   Junior Andrew Ellison (0-0, 1.65, SV) is scheduled to make his first collegiate start on Saturday. Currently the leader among qualifying pitchers with a 0.73 ERA in Ivy League games this season, Ellison had been piggybacking on starts by freshman Jonathan Zacharias (0-3, 3.21) over the last four weeks.
•   Junior Jeb Bemiss (2-1, 5.68) is scheduled to anchor the series after his gem at Harvard. He's yielded just one run while fanning 22 over 17.2 innings during his last four outings.
•   The Big Red boasts two of the best relievers in the league, though one of them (Ellison) is moving to the rotation this weekend. The other, junior John Natoli (2-1, 1.96, 4 SV) has been a force with 31 strikeouts in 23 innings.
•   Four freshmen have eight relief appearances each, led by Niko Lillios (0-0, 3.38).
 

Honor Roll:

•   Cornell placed five on the All-Ivy League teams last season, but just senior Will Simoneit returns from that group. Simoneit was placed on the All-Ivy Second Team for a second straight year, with the unique distinction of garnering those honors from different positions — catcher in 2017; third base in 2018.
 

About Princeton:

•   The Tigers are nestled right above the Big Red in the Ivy League standings with a 4-8 record in conference games and a 8-21 record overall.
•   Princeton is coming off an 11-0 romp of neighbor Rider on Wednesday. Nadir Lewis was 3-for-5 with a stolen base and pair of RBI as one of five Tigers to smack multiple hits on the day. Reece Rabin went five innings to earn the win.
•   The Tigers have won once in all four of their Ivy League series to date, with three of those wins coming in the finale. That included their trip last weekend to Penn, when they pounded out six hits and plated all seven of they runs in the second inning. After a 15-9 loss Friday, Princeton split Saturday with a 1-0 loss and 7-2 win. 
•   As a team, Princeton is batting .244, has a 5.67 earned run average and .960 fielding percentage. Scott Bradley is in his 22nd season as the head coach of the Tigers.
•   Max West, the team's everyday catcher, leads the team with a .330 average, .423 on-base percentage and 20 RBIs. Jake Boone ranks second with a .302 average; Chris Davis (.294) has a team-high nine doubles and team-high .445 slugging percentage, and Nadir Lewis (.291) is one of three players with a team-best two home runs.
•   The Tigers use a consistent rotation headed by lefty Ryan Smith (2-3, 4.06), followed by righties James Proctor (1-4, 3.72, SHO) and Andrew Gnazzo (3-4, 5.19).
•   The bullpen has not been used heavily in close Ivy League games. Lefty Eric Hoefer (0-3, 5.27, SV) leads the team with 11 relief appearances and has appeared in each Ivy series to date. Reece Rabin (2-2, 7.61) and Jack Anderson (0-0, 5.79) are other favored options on Ivy League weekends.
 

Series History vs. Princeton:

•   The Tigers are the second-most frequent opponent for the Big Red in program history, with this weekend's three games pushing the total number of meetings between the squads to 253. 
•   Princeton took the final two of a three-game set last year in New Jersey. The Big Red opened with a 5-2 win, with Jason Apostle going 3-for-4 with a stolen base and two RBI before Colby Wyatt earned the save with two scoreless innings.
•   The Tigers went on to final the next two games, 10-4 and 7-6. Josh Arndt was 2-for-5 with a run scored in the series finale.
 

Up Next:

•   Cornell plays its second of the season's three mid-week games against Binghamton at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday in Vestal before returning home for another three-game Ivy League series next weekend against Penn.