April 18, 2011
WASHINGTON - The season for the Georgetown University baseball team has moved just past the mid-point and there have been several highlights for the Hoyas, who closed out a three-game homestand over the weekend with a 3-2 win over Pittsburgh on Sunday at Shirley Povich Field in Bethesda, Md.
Georgetown's game on Tuesday, April 19 against Norfolk State at home has been canceled, but the Hoyas will hit the road this weekend to play at Connecticut.
The first game of the series will be played on Thursday, April 21 at 3 p.m. in Storrs, Conn. The second game of the series will be played on Friday, April 22 at 6 p.m. in New Britain, Conn. as the teams will play at the home of the New Britain Rock Cats, the AA teams of the Minnesota Twins. The series finale will be played on Saturday, April 23 (1 p.m.) at UConn's campus. Georgetown enters the weekend with a 19-19 overall record and a 2-10 mark in the BIG EAST, while UConn is 21-12-1 and 10-2 in league play.
Sophomore shortstop Mike Garza (San Antonio, Texas/Douglas MacArthur) leads the team in batting with a .349 average (52-for-149). Garza leads the team in runs scored (38), hits (42), runs batted in (31) and on-base percentage (.423), is second in doubles (12) and total bases (73), is third in at-bats (149) and fourth in slugging percentage (.490). Garza leads the BIG EAST in hits and runs scored, is fifth in batting, ranks fifth in doubles and total bases, stands sixth in RBI and is 11th in on-base percentage.
Junior right fielder Rand Ravnaas (Fort Worth, Texas/All Saints Episcopal), who hit an RBI double in the bottom of the ninth inning in Sunday's 3-2 win, is batting .333 (51-for-153), with 11 doubles, five home runs and 29 RBI. Ravnaas leads the team in home runs, total bases (81) stolen bases (19) and slugging percentage (.529), is second on the team in hits and RBI and is tied for third in runs scored and doubles.
Senior catcher Erick Fernandez (Hialeah, Fla./Hialeah) is batting .319 (38-for-119), with 11 doubles, four home runs and 24 RBI. Fernandez, who was selected to the Johnny Bench Award Watch List in the preseason, has thrown out 12 runners stealing this season.
Senior reliever Pablo Vinent (Hialeah, Fla./Belen Jesuit) picked up the win against Pittsburgh on Sunday, improving to 4-1 this season after throwing 3.0 innings and giving one up one run with no hits. He came on in relief of redshirt junior Tommy Isaacs (Pont Vedre Beach, Fla./Bolles), who gave up one run on three hits in six innings of work.
Off the field, the Hoyas have been just as busy, and just as successful. Members of the team, led by senior first baseman Dan Capeless (Centreville, Mass./Boston College HS), helped to raise funds for the Georgetown Relay for Life Event, held this past weekend on campus. The team helped to raise more than $1,000 for the American Cancer Society.
After playing in a doubleheader on Friday night, members of the baseball team arrived back on campus and went to the Relay for Life event in support of one of their own, as relief pitcher Mike Seander (Cranston, R.I./St. Raphael Academy) was performing live for the crowd. Seander is a graduate student in the sports industry management program and has aspirations for a career as a hip-hop artist. Performing under the stage name "Mike Stud," Seander has had his songs played in local establishments, performed live sets of four or five songs at different institutions in the area,
The weekend series against Pittsburgh also allowed the opportunity for a few former Hoya baseball players to return to campus for the weekend. Former baseball standouts Marc Siegel (B'89), who was one of the founders of the program's Career Night, and Cary Piligian (B'10), who is working Merrill Lynch in Washington, D.C., was joined by Billy Cupelo (B'10), who is working for a research firm outside of his hometown in Boston. Cupelo, as he did last year, conducted post-game interviews on the field for the Georgetown Athletics website.
