NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — Jakobi Davis and Max Jensen, two rising senior Cornell baseball players, were announced as participants in this Sunday's NECBL Home Run Derby, the league office announced Tuesday afternoon.

The NECBL Home Run Derby will take place prior to the league's All-Star Game at Muzzy Field in Bristol, Conn., beginning at 2:45 p.m., and will be broadcast on the NECBL Network free of charge powered by HudlTV. First pitch for the All-Star Game is slated for 5:10 p.m., and will be broadcast on ESPN+.

Each of the 13 teams in the NECBL will have a representative in the Home Run Derby and will have three minutes to hit as many home runs as they can. Unlike the MLB's Home Run Derby, participants cannot call a timeout. The top two hitters with the most home runs after the first round will move to the championship.

In the championship round, the two participants will get four minutes to hit as many home runs as they can. Each player can call a 30-second timeout, which can be used any time during their four-minute round. The player with the most home runs in the championship round will be crowned the 2024 Home Run Derby Champion. Should there be a tie, a one-minute tiebreaker round will be implemented to determine the winner.

Cornell is the lone program to have multiple representatives in this year's Home Run Derby, and is one of two Ivy League programs (Brown) with a player participating.

Davis is the lone representative from the Danbury Westerners in this year's Home Run Derby field of 13 participants. In 22 games with the Westerners, Davis is batting .127 with one home run, four RBI, and has swiped six bases — which is tied for second on the team. The lone home run of the year for Davis came last Thursday, July 11, in a 13-3 run-rule-shortened loss to the Valley Blue Sox.

This past year with Cornell, Davis started in all 35 of his appearances with the Big Red, batting .265 with four doubles, two triples, three home runs, and 14 RBI.

Jensen, who was named the starting third baseman for the West Division all-star team on Sunday, will represent the Vermont Mountaineers in the Home Run Derby.

After concluding the 2024 season with Cornell riding an 18-game hit streak, Jensen picked up where he left off as he leads the Vermont Mountaineers in batting average (.388), and doubles (9). Jensen's 33 hits are tied for the team lead with Boston College's Josiah Ragsdale and his three home runs has him in a four-way tie for the team lead, joined by Nathan Waugh '24, Ragsdale, and North Carolina's Samuel Angelo.

Aiding Vermont to its 22-8 record, which is good enough for a three-game lead in the North Division over the Keene SwampBats, Jensen collected hits in 15 consecutive games between June 5-28, batting .444 (28-for-63) with seven doubles, one triple, three home runs, and 19 RBI during the span. Along with his batting average, Jensen logged a 1.237 OPS (.507 on-base percentage and .730 slugging percentage) and posted consecutive four-RBI games against Keene (June 16) and Danbury (June 18), going a combined 5-for-8 at the plate in the pair of contests.

Despite not playing with the Mountaineers since July 5, Jensen's .388 batting average ranks third in the NECBL behind East Carolina's Dixon Williams' .458 clip and Arkansas' Reese Robinett's .395 figure, and his 22 RBI are the sixth-most in the NECBL.
 

2024 NECBL Home Run Derby Participants
Player	Team	Position	Institution
Scott Seeker	Martha's Vineyard Sharks	1B/DH	Mount St. Mary's
Jayden Hylton	Mystic Schooners	OF	Stetson
Tyler Hare	Newport Gulls	OF/1B	Wofford
Brady Dever	North Shore Navigators	CF/1B	Brown
Zach Plasschaert	Ocean State Waves	1B/OF	Arizona
CJ Willis	Sanford Mainers	OF	Quinnipiac
Michael Zarrillo	Bristol Blues	3B/1B	Lafayette
Jakobi Davis	Danbury Westeners	OF	Cornell
Ripken Reese	Keene SwampBats	OF	Kent State
DJ Perron Jr.	North Adams SteepleCats	3B	Rhode Island
DJ Pacheco	Upper Valley Nighthawks	OF/INF	Richmond
Jonathan Hogart	Valley Blue Sox	OF	Murray State
Max Jensen	Vermont Mountaineers	3B	Cornell