As the Ohio baseball team enters the season's home stretch and conference standings heat up the Bobcats hit the road to face non-conference foe Dayton in preparation for a weekend showdown at rival Miami.
Ohio (18-22, 10-11 Mid-American Conference) defeated Akron (13-31, 7-14 MAC) twice last weekend to take its third conference series win of the season.
This is pretty big
Ohio pitcher Yale Silverman said, because now we got two teams in front of us and if we play like this I think we can go out and try to win.
Ohio's wins combined with Kent State's (32-15, 16-5 MAC) sweep of Bowling Green (22-23, 9-12 MAC) last weekend pushed the Bobcats into third place in the East division, one game ahead of the Falcons.
With two MAC series left in the season Ohio must face East division rival and second-place Miami (24-22, 12-9 MAC) before finishing the season against Bowling Green.
Ohio coach Joe Carbone emphasized that the goals for today's game at Dayton is preparing for the weekend.
We're going to run all those freshmen pitchers out there and see what they can do Carbone said. We're going to give some of the other guys a chance to play and have them ready for Miami but right now we're just going to get ready for Dayton and try to win a game.
The Bobcats' game at Dayton also provides four Ohio hitters with an opportunity to extend double-digit hitting streaks.
Bryant Witt's 19-game hitting streak is the longest hitting streak since former catcher Ben Crabtree, Ohio's all-time hits leader, compiled an 18-game streak last season.
Witt, not known for his power, described his first career homer in Friday's 14-4 loss to Akron:
Got a monkey off my back so hopefully more to follow
Witt said.
Outfielder Willie Walker trails Witt with his own 18-game hitting streak. Walker's 3-for-4 performance in Sunday's 10-4 victory over Akron increased his batting average 10 points to .397.
Infielders Dusty Hammond (11 games) and Hayden Johnston (10 games) also recorded multiple hits in Sunday's win to round out Ohio's double-digit hitting streaks.
First pitch is set for 4 p.m. today as Ohio visits Dayton (27-19, 15-6 Atlantic 10).
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Brandon Besl (4) and the Bobcats hope to snag a victory at Dayton today. Ohio (18-22, 10-11 MAC) has four hitters set to continue double-digit hitting streaks. The Bobats face the Flyers today at 4 p.m.
