Hanover
Seven or eight of Dartmouth’s likely starting players for those upcoming games made appearances during what turned out to be a 5-4 loss to the Bobcats. Both teams used seven pitchers, and the Big Green’s Nick Ruppert, Michael Ketchmark and Dustin Shirley each had two hits. Teammate Joe Puritano drove in two runs with a triple.
Bob Whalen, Dartmouth’s 27th-year coach, noted he started three freshmen because of the absence of several injured regulars. His team led, 3-1, after an inning, but Quinnipiac (7-14) used two hits and a walk against reliever Jack Fossand during the fifth inning to move ahead for good.
As usual, the Big Green (5-14) is coming off a tough nonconference slate that included a three-game series at No. 1 Florida and big-conference foes such as Iowa and South Florida. That partially explains the team’s .225 batting average, although Whalen wasn’t willing to use such an excuse. Last year’s squad was 4-14 and batting .240 at this stage and advanced to the league title series.
“I never take myself or the players off the hook,” he said. “We need to do more offensively. We’re not scoring enough runs and we need to find ways to put pressure on other teams, but we focus more on having consistent length to our lineup.
“We want six- or seven-pitch at-bats and to be able to move a runner over no matter where we are in the lineup.”
Designated hitter Puritano, a senior selected in the 30th round of last year’s Major League Baseball entry draft, is a career .291 hitter now at .278. Another senior, center fielder Ruppert, hit .310 last season but currently is at .170. Junior outfielder Ben Socher is hitting .245, nearly 30 points off his 2015 mark. On the flip side, however, junior first baseman Ketchmark is up to .250 from .206.
The pitching staff is anchored by senior ace Duncan Robinson, last year’s Ivy League pitcher of the year, who tossed a complete-game 1-0 victory at South Florida last weekend. Junior Michael Danielak, senior Beau Sulser and freshman Cole O’Connor are expected to round out the weekend rotation now that Ivy play is here. Danielak sat out last season because of knee problems while Sulser was recovering from Tommy John surgery on his throwing arm.
“Recently, our pitchers have been absolutely dominating dogs on the mound and we’ve played smart defense,” Ruppert said. “If our hitting comes around, we could be an extra good ball club.”
That Ruppert is playing at all is a measure of good fortune. The Californian was hit in the left cheek by a Lehigh pitch nearly two weeks ago, and although he avoided a concussion, the first five days of his recovery weren’t fun.
“At first, I thought I was going to be spitting out teeth,” said Ruppert, who now bats with an extended ear flap on his helmet and whose left eye remains a bit bloodshot. “I had some cuts in my mouth and they’ve healed, but I still can’t chew on that side of my mouth. I couldn’t sleep on that side until recently; my face was just too swollen.”
Also hurting are senior shortstop Thomas Roulis, who missed all of last season with an injury and currently is sidelined after being hit in the ankle by a pitch, and sophomore outfielder Kyle Holbrook, who’s nursing a sprained ankle. It seems the former is more likely than the latter to be ready for the upcoming road trip.
“At this point, you just have to dig deep and show a little heart and absolutely battle your (butt) off,” Ruppert said of the beginning of Ivy play. “This year, the players we have are extremely capable of that and we have to keep playing for one another.”
The league season consists on paper of five consecutive four-game weekends. Weather, however, can throw those plans into disarray. A few years ago, Dartmouth stayed in New Jersey until a Tuesday to get in games at Princeton. A few years before that, the Big Green traveled to Brown three different times to get in four games against the Bears.
Now comes word of anticipated bad weather in upstate New York this weekend. Weather.com predicts a 40 percent chance of precipitation for Sunday in Ithaca, N.Y., and that precipitation might be snow.
“I’m not going to let our players obsess over how long the bus ride is or what’s going to happen once we get there,” Whalen said. “We’ll roll the balls out and play.”
Notes: Dartmouth’s schedule includes six teams that reached NCAA tournament play last season. The only one it has yet to face is defending Ivy champ Columbia. … Dartmouth’s roster includes nine Californians. The states with the next-highest numbers are Texas and Illinois, each with three. … Nick Lombardi, Dartmouth’s third baseman the past few years, had been playing professionally in Australia but has signed with the Rockland Boulders of the independent Can-Am League. The Boulders play in Pomona, N.Y., roughly an hour’s drive north of New York City. … Whalen’s son, Matt, a former Hanover High student and now a senior at Phillips Andover (Mass.) Academy, will attend Maine’s Bowdoin College next fall, where he’s expected to play football and baseball. … Holy Cross visits Dartmouth on April 6. The Crusaders’ roster includes junior pitcher Joe Cravero, of Hanover, who has made 10 relief appearances for a combined 16 1/3 innings with a 1-0 record and an ERA of 1.65 for an 8-16 team. Cravero saw limited action his first two years in the program. … A request to play Sweet Caroline on the public-address system Wednesday was instantly vetoed by sports information director Rick Bender, a lifelong New York Yankees fan. … Dartmouth’s spring football practice begins April 12. … Former Big Green basketball point guard Alex Mitola transferred to George Washington as a graduate student after last season. He and the Colonials will face Valparaiso tonight at New York City’s Madison Square Garden in the National Invitational Tournament final. The 7 p.m. game can be seen on ESPN.
Tris Wykes can be reached at twykes@vnews.com or 603-727-3227.