Baseball

Park Smith leads the Big Red with a .420 batting average and two complete game shutouts in nine starts. Denison will host Kenyon in the NCAC semifinals on Saturday at 1 p.m.

The Denison baseball team will open post season play on Saturday (May 3) when they host Kenyon College in a best two out of three series at Big Red Field in Granville.  The two teams will play a pair of nine-inning games on Saturday with a potential third game scheduled for Sunday at 1 p.m., if necessary.

Denison enters the playoffs with a 24-16 record.  The Big Red posted a 12-4 record in the NCAC West and locked up their fourth division title with a four-game sweep of Earlham College on April 20.  Sophomore first baseman/pitcher Park Smith (Warren, N.J./The Pingry School) is fourth in the NCAC in hits and is leading the squad with a .420 batting average.  His 14 doubles is also fourth-most in the conference.  On the mound, Smith has served as the Big Red's third starter all season.  He is 4-4 with a team-high two shutouts.

The Big Red's pitching has been the backbone of the team in 2008.  The staff boasts a 4.33 ERA and is led by senior aces JD Wyborny (Walnut Creek, Calif./Monte Vista) and James Clear (Hamilton, Ohio/Badin).  Opponents are batting just .219 against Wyborny.  He is third in the conference with a 2.27 ERA and has struck out 51 batters in 63.1 innings pitched.  Like Wyborny, Clear also has five wins and a 3.79 ERA which is second-best among DU starters.  He is seventh in the NCAC in strikeouts and fifth in innings pitched.  Combined, Clear and Wyborny have pitched 403.1 innings since 2005.

The Lords, like the Big Red, have relied on two strong arms at the front of their rotation throughout the season.  Tom Boucher leads the NCAC in wins (8) and has fired four complete games.  His 3.12 ERA is best among Kenyon starters.  He is followed by Geoff Bollier who is 4-5 with a 4.95 ERA in nine starts.  At the back end of the bullpen, Nate Fedor is tied with Denison's Aidan Lucas (Evanston, Ill./Evanston Twp.) for second in the conference with six saves.  On April 23, Boucher, Bollier and Fedor combined for a 3-0 shutout victory over the Big Red in game one of a doubleheader.  Denison bounced back for a 7-2 win in the nightcap to force a split.

Saturday's semifinals will mark the third and fourth meeting between Denison and Kenyon in 2008 but, since 2002, the Big Red and Lords have played just four times.  Due to the conference's divisional split, non league contests have been a rarity in recent years.  That hasn't always been the case.  Denison's records show 103 total games between the two neighboring schools with the first recorded meeting going all the way back to 1890.  Since the formation of the North Coast Athletic Conference in 1985, Denison leads the series 30-16.

The winner of the Denison-Kenyon semifinal will advance to the NCAC Championship Series against the winner of the Wooster-Ohio Wesleyan semifinal.  The championship series will take place on May 8-9 at Big Red Field in Granville.