YSUsports.com - Baseball: Penguins Hope to Make Horizon League Tournament Stay a Long One in Lorain

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May 19, 2009

Penguins Hope to Make Horizon League Tournament Stay a Long One in Lorain

Youngstown -- Youngstown State will kick off the 2009 Horizon League Baseball Championship at 3 p.m. Tuesday with an elimination game against Butler. The tournament will be held at Cleveland State’s home, The Pipe Yard, in Lorain, Ohio. Audio of all of YSU’s games can be heard live on YSUsports.com.

If the No. 6 Penguins defeat the No. 7 Bulldogs, a team they went 4-1 against during the season, they will advance to play Wright State on Wednesday in the double-elimination format of the bracket.

YSU finished the regular season with a 16-34 overall mark, which included a 10-14 ledger in league games. The Penguins enter the tournament having won two straight games behind a strong offense. YSU is batting .330 with 11 home runs in May, which is a big improvement over its .264 average in April.

First-Team All-Horizon League pitcher Phil Klein will take the mound against Butler, and 2008 Horizon League Pitcher of the Year Aaron Swenson will follow if the Penguins advance. Jacke Healey joined Klein in earning first-team all-league, and David Leon and Eric Marzec were named second-team.

Right Off The Bat

YSU is 7-5 as the lower seed and 1-7 as the higher seed all-time in Horizon League Tournament games.
Of YSU’s 14 Horizon League losses, seven were by one run and one was been by two. Five of the seven one-run losses came in the last at bat.
Aaron Swenson and Corey Vukovic are the only YSU pitchers who have previously appeared in the Horizon League Tournament.
YSU has hit 11 home runs in 10 games this month.

Swenson, Klein Form Strong Strikeout Duo

Youngstown State starting pitchers Aaron Swenson and Phil Klein have formed one of the best strikeout duos in school history. Swenson struck out his 70th batter against Buffalo on May 13, and Klein has struck out 76. This is the second time in YSU history that two pitchers have fanned at least 70 batters in the same season. BIll Sattler (89) and Dave Dravecky (77) did it in 1977. Both of those players went on to get selected in the Major League Baseball draft. Dravecky was a National League All-Star in 1983 and pitched in the 1984 World Series.

Klein K’s 12 in Last Start vs. Valpo

Phil Klein will come into the Horizon League Tournament with some major momentum. In his last start against Valparaiso on May 9, he struck out a career-high 12 batters in seven innings. That was the highest single-game total since Justin Thomas fanned 15 Cleveland State batters on April 10, 2005. Over his last 26 innings, Klein has struck out 34 batters.

Team Batting AVG at Highest Point

YSU has its batting average up to a season-high .278 entering the Horizon League Tournament. The Penguins have hit .330 over their last 13 games to bring their average up from .259 on April 26. In the last 13 games, YSU has posted 10 hits or more eight times and has not had fewer than eight in a game that has not been shortened by weather.

May Nothing Like April at the Plate

The Penguins have really stepped it up offensively in their first 10 games in May. The Penguins are batting .330 this month and have scored 78 runs in the 10 games. The Penguins have 17 doubles, three triples and 11 homers.

By comparison, YSU had a cold April at the plate. The Penguins hit .264 with 77 runs scored, 23 doubles and three homers.

Healey’s Bat Rare for Shortstops

Junior Jacke Healey has made a strong case to be recognized as the top offensive shortstop in YSU history in just one season. His eight home runs are the most ever by a YSU shortstop, and he is the first shortstop in school history to be named first-team all-conference.

Healey leads YSU in homers, runs scored, RBIs, doubles, slugging percentage and total bases. He batted .377 with runners in scoring position, and he was strong defensively with a .951 fielding percentage. Healey, also an all-newcomer team pick, is in his first year at YSU as a transfer from Potomac State College.

Trend of YSU and Cleveland State Eliminating Each Other

Cleveland State and Youngstown State have always been rivals due to their close proximity, but that has carried out onto the field in recent years. The teams have eliminated each other from the Horizon League Tournament in four of the last five years. That trend started when YSU defeated Cleveland State in the tournament championship game in 2004. Last season, Cleveland State ousted YSU from the tournament at Eastwood Field with a 10-4 victory.

Recent Tournaments in Ohio Have Been Unfriendly

Since Youngstown State won the Horizon League Tournament at Eastwood Field, the Guins have not had any postseason success in the Buckeye state. YSU has gone 0-4 in tournament games since its 2004 run - 0-2 in 2006 at Wright State and 0-2 last season at Eastwood Field.

Back-to-Back First-Team Pitchers

With Phil Klein earning first-team all-league mentioning, the Penguins have had a first-team all-conference pitcher in back-to-back seasons for the second time in school history. Aaron Swenson was the Horizon League Pitcher of the Year and first-team all-league last season. Shane Mead (1997) and Gary Gubanich (1996) earned first-team all-league nods previously in back-to-back seasons. Gubanich’s last season was 1996, so this is the first time in school history that YSU has had two first-team all-conference pitchers on its roster at the same time.

Penguins Welcome Marzec, Dissinger Back to Lineup

The Penguins will get a lift with the return of Eric Marzec and Greg Dissinger for the Horizon League Tournament. Marzec had a cast removed from his glove hand on Thursday, and he will be eligible to pitch this week. He has not played since April 18 because of a broken bone in his hand that he suffered from being hit with a pitch. Marzec had two saves, a 2.40 ERA and 18 strikeouts in 15 innings out of the bullpen before his injury. He was also leading the Penguins in triples (3), homers (5) and slugging (.524), but he will more than likely remain out of the batting order.

Dissinger has been limited to playing in 22 games with an ankle injury early in the season and a recent bout of mono. He got off to a hot start in Horizon League play with seven hits in 18 at bats, but he has not played since April 14 because of a bout with mono.

Banks Strong to End to First Year

Freshman Jeremy Banks has hit safely in 13 of the final 14 games this season and in 10 straight. Over the last 10 games, he is batting .389 with three home runs, 12 runs scored and a team-high 17 RBIs. In his first 34 games he had 16 runs, one homer and 12 RBIs.

Banks hit .281 with 28 runs scored, four home runs and 29 RBIs during the regular season. His .392 on base percentage ranked second on the team. He was even better against Horizon League opponents, posting a .324 average and .415 OBP.

Slow Starts Were a Problem Early

Youngstown State found itself in an early hole in many games this season, especially in non-conference contests. The Penguins were outscored by 85 runs (223-138) or 1.7 runs per game in the first five innings. In their 24 Horizon League games, the margin was just 76-69. YSU was outscoring its opponents in the first five innings of league games before Wright State held a 19-9 advantage in the doubleheader on May 8.

A big contributor to the scoring margin has been opposing teams’ batting average in the third through fifth innings. During the regular season, opponents batted .356 in the third inning, .353 in the fourth and .352 in the fifth.

Kinnick, Munoz Have Been Solid Out of the Bullpen

Anthony Munoz and Jim Kinnick both enter the Horizon League Tournament with impressive scoreless streaks. Munoz has not been scored upon in any of his last six outings, which has spanned 6.2 innings. He has struck out seven batters and allowed four hits in that span. Kinnick has not allowed a run in his last 5.1 innings, and it’s been almost a month since he allowed an earned run. His last earned run came on April 22 against Kent State. Since then he’s thrown 9.1 innings, allowing one run on three hits while striking out six.

Healey’s Been Clutch Late

Jacke Healey has been at his best in the late innings this season. After the fifth inning, he is batting .391 with, five home runs, 23 RBIs, 21 runs scored and a .884 slugging percentage. Overall, Healey is batting .377 with runners in scoring position and has 14 two-out RBIs. His 12 multi-RBI games are also a team-high.

Guins Perfect on Thefts in Final Two Weeks

The Penguins were a perfect 9-for-9 in the final two weeks of the regular season, and they have not been caught in their last 12 attempts. During that span, Jacke Healey and John Koehnlein went 3-for-3, Jeremy Banks and C.J. Morris went 2-for-2, and Derek Carr and David Leon went 1-for-1.

Since April 12, YSU has stolen 27 bases in 21 games. The Penguins have been caught just four times in that span. Prior to April 12, YSU had 22 steals in 29 games but had been caught 16 times.

Healey Putting Together Solid Season

Jacke Healey has hit eight home runs and 17 doubles, both of which are team-highs, in his first season since arriving from Potomac State. The totals put him in rare company in the Penguins’ recent history. He joins Mark Thomas (1999) as the only players in school history to have at least eight home runs and 17 doubles in the same season. Thomas, a 21st round pick by the Montreal Expos, hit nine home runs and 22 doubles in 1999.

Long Road for Tourney Title Run

If the Penguins want to win the Horizon League Championship, they will have to win at least five games this week. Last year’s No. 6 seed, Valparaiso, worked its way up to a third-place finish last season by going 3-2. One of those wins came against Youngstown State. Last season was the first for the play-in game format. No sixth-seeded team has ever won the league title.

Up Next: Wright State

If YSU advances past Butler, it will play No. 3 Wright State on Wednesday at 3 p.m. That game will be part of the double-elimination format.