April 16, 2012
NORFOLK, VA-- The ODU Baseball Monarchs take on Norfolk State Tuesday night at Harbor Park, home of the AAA Norfolk Tides. First pitch is scheduled for 6:15 p.m. For those who can't make it to the contest you can listen to it live on Star1310 WGH AM Radio with Ted Alexander, Doug Ripley and ODU Hall of Fame pitcher Wayne Gomes ('94) providing the play-by-play and color.
Tickets are $7 and can be purchased throught the ODU athletic ticket office or at Harbor Park the night of the game. The proceeds from advance ticket sales from the ODU box office will benefit the ODAF and baseball programs. Tickets are $7 and available at the box office at the Ted and at Harbor Park
This will be the second meeting this season between the two teams as NSU won theopener at the Bud Metheny Baseball Complex, 7-5 back on March 28th.
Through 36 games Austin McGowan leads ODU (13-23) with a .316 batting average, followed by the Bridgewater, VA duo of senior shortstop Josh Wright (.299) and senior catcher Josh Tutwiler (.299) both also have hit a team best six homers. Wright has a slugging percentage of .575 and an onbase mark of .444 while crossing home plate 38 times. Tutwiler's slugging percentage is .538.
Senior firstbaseman Chris Baker is hitting .293 with six homers and a team best32 RBI.
On the mound, senior Brandon Smith is 6-1 while freshman Dylan Bratton has a 2.45 ERA, followed by Dean Ali with a 2.67 ERA and two saves. Ben Tomchick ranks amongthe CAA's best with 54 strikeouts in 51 innings of work. ODU is scheduled to start freshman pitcher Greg Tomchick.
The Spartans (11-20) are led by Cameron Day with a .333 batting average, followed byrafael Colon at .315 and James Taylor at .313. Ryan Montgomery leads the team with15 RBI.
"We are certainly excited about the opportunity to get downtown and play NSU at Harbor Park. A big thanks to Dave Rosenfield for spearheading this. I hope all our fans will come out and support us, especially since this game will be a fundraiser for our baseball program with all advance ticket sales going back to our program. Having two Division I baseball programs in the same city is rare and I hope we can use events like this to continue to grow college baseball in the Hampton Roads area." - ODU Baseball coach Chris Finwood.
The Monarchs return to CAA play this weekend at George Mason beginning Friday at3 p.m. in Fairfax, VA. ODU then returns home the weekend of April 27-29 to hostVCU.