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UWM Heads To Indiana For Games Against Notre Dame And Butler

Face Irish Wednesday before weekend series with Bulldogs

March 25, 2008

Two trips to the state of Indiana are up next for the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee baseball team, as it plays at Notre Dame Wednesday before making a return trip on the weekend to close out the schedule in the month of March. The Panthers will travel to Indianapolis for a weekend set with Butler, starting things off Friday at 2 p.m. CST. The Panthers and Bulldogs then wrap up the weekend league series with a doubleheader Saturday starting at 11 a.m. CST.

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All four games played this week will be available on-line via Gametracker and the series against Butler is also scheduled to be broadcasted live on the internet. Log on to the Butler athletics website for the link to the play-by-play audio via Big Play Radio Sports at www.butlersports.com. The links to the broadcast are also available on the UWM baseball schedule page.

Notre Dame leads the series with Milwaukee by a count of 9-3, but the two teams have not played since the 2001 season when Notre Dame won, 12-4. The Panthers carry the 41-22 all-time series edge with Butler, although BU has won three of the past six meetings. The two teams split four games during the regular season a year ago.

The 2008 campaign marks the 44th season of baseball at UWM. It is also the 39th season of varsity play (the program was played at the club level from 1982-1986) and the 18th in the Panthers NCAA Division I era.

SCOUTING THE OPPOSITION
Notre Dame returns 19 letterwinners from its 2007 team that went 28-28 while welcoming a group of 19 newcomers to the roster. The recruiting class was ranked as high as fourth in the country by Collegiate Baseball and sixth by Baseball America. The Irish veterans are led by five position players who have been regular starters in previous seasons: catcher Sean Gaston, shortstop Brett Lilley, leftfielder Ross Brezovsky, second baseman Jeremy Barnes and third baseman A.J. Pollock. The team is 10-7 after sweeping Georgetown over the weekend by scores of 25-1, 7-1 and 6-0. The Irish will also host Ball State Tuesday before welcoming the Panthers to Frank Eck Stadium.

Pollock is one of the leaders on the offense (which is batting .305 as a team) with a .324 average and also has scored and driven in 11 runs. Evan Sharpley leads the team with five home runs, 17 RBI's and a .439 average in just 41 at-bats on the year. David Phelps (3-2, 3.41 ERA) and Wade Korpi (3-1, 4.15 ERA) lead the staff.

Butler started the season with 10-straight losses before snapping the skid with a 3-2 win at Tennessee Tech March 16. The Bulldogs used that momentum to take two of three from Youngstown State in their opening Horizon League series of the season. To say the offense has been struggling is an understatement, as the team carries a .188 batting average into play this week where it will welcome IPFW Tuesday and then play at Louisville Wednesday before playing host to UWM on the weekend. Rick Betsch leads the way at .259 with Grant Fillipitch second with a .254 clip. Ryan Neat is hitting .220 but leads the team with two home runs and five driven in.

BORDER BATTLE WITH UIC COMES UP A RUN SHORT A GAME
Milwaukee made the trip to Chicago this past weekend to open Horizon League play against the defending-champ UIC Flames. After several schedule changes and plenty of snow-shoveling, the two teams played the series despite winter-like conditions. The three close games provided plenty of excitement for the fans that braved the weather, but unfortunately, the Panthers came up on the wrong end of three-straight one-run games in falling 9-8, 2-1 and 5-4.

Senior Nick Wichser led the offense with a .500 average, collecting five hits in 10 at-bats. Junior Shawn Wozniak was close behind at .400, driving in three and adding his first home run of the season. The staff performed admirably as well, with four of the six pitchers that appeared in the series recording 0.00 earned run averages.

LET THE LEAGUE GAMES BEGIN!
Milwaukee is happy to see the start of conference play, as it has posted the best record in Horizon League games of any team since 1995, UWM's first year in the Horizon League/MCC. In that time, the Panthers have gone 168-113 (.597), while posting a 6-7 record in league openers. A year ago, Larry Gempp's walk-off single in the bottom of the ninth inning gave UIC a 9-8 victory over the Panthers. UWM held an 8-6 lead in the eighth but could not hold off the Flames.

CONSECUTIVE ONE-RUN LOSSES A RARITY
The three-straight one-run losses at UIC over the weekend were not only hard to swallow, but was nearly unprecedented in the history of the Milwaukee baseball program since it went D-I for the 1991 season. Only one other time in history has the team lost three-consecutive games by one run each and it happened in that inaugural D-I 1991 campaign when it dropped a 6-5 decision to DeKalb March 26 before falling 3-2 and 2-1 to Southern Tech March 27 of that spring. To put that in perspective, that stretch of tough-luck decisions came over 875 games ago. That has been the theme for UWM this year, as it is now 0-6 in one-run games.

MEIER BECOMES AN INSTANT WORKHORSE
After making starts in four straight appearances, junior Craig Meier worked out of the bullpen in the UIC series with impressive results. He appeared in all three games on the weekend, posting a 0.00 earned run average in what turned into 3.0 innings of work. He allowed just two hits (.200 opponent average), struck out two and did not walk a batter despite tough conditions to pitch in.

RED-HOT STRETCH
Senior Nick Wichser has been a force offensively for the past nine games: he has at least one hit in all nine contests and multi-hit efforts in six. After starting the season 4-for-28, Wichser has recorded 16 hits in his last 33 at-bats (.485), scored nine runs and driven in 11. Dating back to last season, he has hit safely in 28 of his last 32 outings.

GUNNING `EM OUT
Sophomore catcher Shaun Wegner continues to throw out base stealers and an impressive rate this season. In his eight starts prior to this weekend, he had already thrown out eight runners trying to steal out of the 21 (38.1%) who attempted to run on him. While he was on the field this weekend, he threw out four of seven UIC runners trying to steal to up his percentage to .429 (12 of 28).

WHAT? ME WORRY?
History for the Panthers proves that a slow start is not indicative of the way the rest of the season will go. Last year, the team finished 25-18 after a 14-game skid at the start of the season. In 2006, the team started 1-5 after its first six games before going 31-20 the rest of the way. In 2001, the Panthers went 39-18 overall after a 1-5 start. Lastly, and most impressively, they went 30-16 to finish 30-24 in 2000 after an 0-8 start.

STRENGTH OF EARLY-SEASON SCHEDULE ANALYSIS
Milwaukee's 1-10 start was very uncharacteristic of the team. However, a closer look at the four teams that UWM had lost to at that point in the season was a better measuring stick for reasons why. On March 10, the four teams were 36-10 for a .783 winning percentage. Centenary was 9-2, Saint Mary's was 8-3, UNC-Wilmington was 9-4 and Jacksonville was 10-1. According to the baseball statistics and analysis website www.boydsworld.com, the Panthers had the 10th-highest strength of schedule for games played through March 10. Entering play this week, they still rank in the top 50.

1. Duquesne
2. San Diego
3. Stanford
4. Cal State Fullerton
5. Texas Christian
6. San Diego State
7. Loyola Marymount
8. Oklahoma State
9. Siena
10. Milwaukee

READY FOR BUS RIDES AND MOTEL STOPS...
The Panthers will be busier than ever while waiting for the snow to melt and Henry Aaron Field to be ready for them to play in Milwaukee. While that happens, they will be playing 27-straight road games to open 2008, the most-ever to start a season in their NCAA Division I history. The previous record of 26 occurred in 2001. UWM will take it as a good sign - the team went 15-11 in those 26 games in 2001 and also had a nine-game win streak in that stretch.

The Panthers will travel more than 12,000 miles over the course of the first seven weeks of the season via plane or bus, visiting six different states (Florida, California, Louisiana, Tennessee, Illinois and Indiana), including two trips to Indiana and four separate road trips to Illinois.

HART ON SEASON-LONG MISSION
Senior Jesse Hart will look to put his name in the UWM record books in numerous spots over the course of his final season. In addition to chasing career records in several categories, he will also look to become the first-ever Panther to bat over .300 in each of his four seasons in a Milwaukee uniform. Charlie Reschke (2002-05) was the last senior in line to give it a shot, but batted .287 his final season.

Hart, a career .342 hitter, batted an impressive .371 in 35 games as a freshman in 2005, .315 in 55 games as a sophomore and .360 as a junior a year ago.

		CAREER RECORDS CHASE
AT-BATS				HITS
1. 737, Ross McCoy (2004-07)		1. 245, Darin Haugom (1997-2001)
2. 692, Darin Haugom (1997-2001)	2. 220, Ross McCoy (2004-07)
3. 683, Charlie Reschke (2002-05)	3. 213, Charlie Reschke (2002-05)
4. 610, Chad Sadowski (1997-2000)	4. 197, Chad Sadowski (1997-2000)
5. 591, Jesse Hart			5. 193, Jesse Hart

PRESEASON SHOWINGS
Milwaukee was picked to take second in the Horizon League season preview put out by www.rivals.com last month, one spot ahead of UIC and behind league favorite Wright State. Three players made its Preseason All-Conference Team: seniors Jesse Hart (at 2B) and Nick Wichser (OF) and junior Josh Groves (3B). UWM was the only team to have three players on the list.

The preseason issue of Baseball America featured its 2008 College Preview as well. The Panthers were slotted for third in its version, behind UIC and, once again, WSU as the top pick. Hart and Groves appeared on the Preseason All-Conference Team.

GROVES GETTING `PUB'
Junior Josh Groves became the first Panther to ever be named to the College Baseball Foundation Brooks Wallace Award Watch List in December. The Wallace Award is presented annually to the nation's top collegiate baseball player.

Groves had a breakout season as a sophomore in 2007, leading the team with a .396 average while earning All-Horizon League First Team honors as a utility player to earn a spot on the list, which had its inception prior to the 2004 campaign.

Groves is one of just four players from the Horizon League to make the list, joining John Koehnlein of Youngstown State and the Wright State duo of Justin Parker and Jeremy Hamilton.

DOFFEK IN THE MIX
Milwaukee head coach Scott Doffek established a baseball program record last year for wins by a first-year coach with 25 victories, breaking the former mark of 21. The mark for most wins by a head coach in his first two seasons? That would be 44 by former skipper Jerry Augustine, with 21 in 1995 and 23 in 1996.

BIG SHOES TO FILL
The Panthers will look to replace four team members (three position players and one pitcher) that all earned Second Team All-Horizon League honors a year ago. The trio of position players (Ross McCoy, Rob Brockel, Grant Berkovitz) accounted for 618 at-bats and a composite .306 batting average, 110 runs scored and 102 runs batted in. The pitcher (Robert Michalkiewicz) led the squad in earned run average, wins, games started, innings pitched, shutouts and complete games and was second in strikeouts.

PROFESSIONAL PANTHERS
Another summer of baseball meant another summer of former Panthers playing professionally across the United States. Mike Goetz batted .318 for the Helena Brewers, the Rookie League affiliate of the Milwaukee Brewers. He scored 28 runs in 46 games, recording 27 runs batted in and stealing 11 bases before getting called up to the Huntsville Stars at the end of the season.

Ross McCoy signed as a free agent with the Utica Brewmasters in the New York State League in June. After the short state league season was over, he was promoted to the Lincoln Saltdogs of the American Association on July 21 where he batted .302 in 29 games, scoring 11 times, recording seven doubles, one home run and drove in 12 runs.

Joe Nowicki started the season with Frederick Keys of the Carolina League, going 2-for-3 in one game before being transferred to the Aberdeen Ironbirds for the remainder of the season. There he batted .283 on the season, hitting .330 in July. Nowicki hit eight home runs and drove in 41 in 69 games en route to being named to the New York-Penn League All-Star Game.

Ben Stanczyk was a Florida State League All-Star with the Brevard County Manatees, recording a 7-4 record with three saves in 43 games. He started four times, striking out 71 batters in 78.2 innings.

PRESEASON POLL
The Panthers were picked third in the 2008 Horizon League preseason baseball poll. They will look to improve on their third place finish from a year ago, when they had their season come to a close in extra innings just one game away from the league tournament championship.

Wright State was the top pick to win the league in the vote of Horizon League head coaches. The Raiders went 36-22 last year, falling in the league tournament championship to UIC. They received 34 points and four of the seven first-place votes. UIC took a close second despite having won its sixth-straight regular season title in 2007 and third tournament crown in that span as well, advancing to the NCAA Tournament.

1. Wright State (4) - 34 points
2. UIC (3) - 32 points
3. Milwaukee - 25 points
4. Butler - 17 points
5. Youngstown State - 14 points
6. Cleveland State - 13 points
7. Valparaiso - 12 points

ON TAP
Milwaukee will make two trips to Illinois next week to play four non-conference games. First up is Northern Illinois for a midweek match-up Wednesday before taking on Southern Illinois in a weekend series scheduled for one game each on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.