The University of Akron Athletics
University of Akron
Eastern Michigan
Zips Baseball Newsletter
March 22 | Baseball
Dear Zip Alumni/Friends:
This past week saw us play West Virginia in Washington, Pa. on Tuesday, University of Pittsburgh on Wednesday, and open up MAC play at Eastern Michigan this past weekend.
Tuesday's game was played in Washington, PA because the Mountaineer's new field is not yet completed. We scheduled this game a week ago as both of us lost games the previous week to weather. West Virginia beat us up as we didn't fare too well on the mound, getting behind 12-0 before we crossed the plate for our first run. Every pitcher we threw in this game was a reliever. As stated in my last newsletter, senior LHP Pat Dyer was struck in the head and will be sidelined for a couple more weeks. We instilled senior RHP Jon Pusateri into his slot on Sundays now and lost the services of Jon as a midweek starter. We went into the game with only three active pitchers because of availability after throwing over the previous weekend. In addition, some guys needed to stay back because of academic duties such as midterms and presentations. Because this game wasn't initially scheduled at the beginning of the year, we had to make sure they were in class as it was unavoidable. We had a van beside our bus for travel and had one guy come back after Tuesday's game and bring back five players for our game Wednesday at Pitt. View the box score.
Wednesday was the debut of two freshmen who grew up in Pennsylvania. Freshman LHP Josh Lapiana started for us and freshman infielder Alex Dirienzo played second base. Josh has seen a couple innings of relief already and is slated to be a midweek starter this year to get his feet wet before he hopefully becomes a weekend starter for us next year. Josh got humbled! 'Working ahead' and 'location' was etched in his memory bank following his performance. Pitt hit him around pretty good and Josh found out it's not as easy as it looks from the bench. Josh does possess a good changeup and when he did have some consecutive outs, he was better by using his changeup after establishing his fastball. He'll face another quality opponent this coming Wednesday at Ohio State. His first two starts as a freshman are ACC foe Pittsburgh followed by Big Ten team, Ohio State. Welcome to DI baseball, Josh! View the box score.
The Zips opened MAC play this past weekend winning the series vs. Eastern Michigan. In summary, we had two well-pitched games from junior LHP John Valek III on Friday, and senior RHP Jon Pusateri on Sunday. Both kept Eastern hitters in check. Sandwiched between was a sub-par performance by junior RHP JT Brubaker and the Zip offense. Considering JT's ability to stifle Michigan State a couple weeks ago, his two performances since against Davidson and Eastern have been below average. He gave up 10 hits and struck out two on Saturday. Pusateri gave us the best outing on the weekend with 6.0 inn, 0 r, 0 bb, and 7 Ks. Sophomore infielder Dom Iero had a great offensive weekend going 9-13 at the plate. Other notables over the past week were junior OF/P Dalton Mosbarger and senior OF Joey Havrilak. View the box scores: W 6-2, L 3-1, W 3-1.
Injury update:
Sr. LHP Pat Dyer has two more weeks of no athletic and academic activity due to his concussion. So. 3B James Meeker III is out for the season with torn ACL and meniscus.
Two big losses but at least we will have Patrick back soon.
Our upcoming week includes Youngstown State for our home opener on Tuesday, traveling to Columbus Wednesday to face the Buckeyes, then coming home to take on Toledo over the weekend. Hope to see you there!
As always, keep us in your thoughts for support in making Akron Baseball better as we move forward. Follow this link to find out how to donate or contact Alexa S. Doutt, J.D., M.Ed. by email atasd9@uakron.edu or phone (330) 972-2695.
You can also follow along with the team this season through our webpage or social media on Twitter (@ZipsBB) and Facebook.
Best regards,
