The Kent State baseball team (27-25, 17-13, #5 seed) opens up Mid-American Conference tournament play on Wednesday at 6:00pm against #4 seed Miami (26-25, 17-13) in game one. The winner of the four-day event in Avon, Ohio will secure the automatic bid to the 2024 NCAA Tournament. The 2023 Flashes came tantalizing and painfully close to making the MAC a two-bid league, before being the last team left out of an at large bid after falling to Ball State in the championship round. There’s no question the MAC is once again a one bid league in 2024.
Miami took two out of three from the Flashes just a couple of weeks ago at Schoonover Stadium. Miami won two one run games, and the Flashes won a blowout.
The winner of this game will advance to play either Bowling Green (Thursday at 2pm) or Western Michigan (Thursday at 6pm), Bowling Green will face the lowest advancing seed. The loser of Wednesday’s game will play the loser of the first game of the tournament between #3 Ball State and #6 Toledo, that game will be Thursday at 10 a.m. The full bracket is here.
KSU BASEBALL NOTEBOOK
ORR WANTS MORE: Kent State senior Tim Orr transferred in from Tiffin and all he does is hit. The Uniontown, Lake product has played first base, DH and the outfield for the Flashes this year, but he hits wherever he goes. Orr is batting .328 on the season, with 10 home runs and 43 RBI. Orr has settled into the #2 spot in Jeff Duncan’s lineup.
Orr was named the Prospect League Mike Schmidt Player of the Year in the offseason. Orr helped his wood-bat summer league team, the Chillicothe Paints, to a second straight league championship, now he looks to help lead the Golden Flashes to the ultimate prize, a trip to a NCAA Regional.
ACTION JACKSON: Senior Kyle Jackson has been a fixture in the KSU lineup since his freshmen year in the 2021 season on the left side of that infield. Playing short stop this year after playing primarily third throughout his career, Jackson has been a reliable cog in the lineup for years. With a personality that’s suited to try out for the Savannah Bananas, Jackson has had a flare for the dramatic during his career. If the game is on the line late, Flashes fans will have faith if Jackson is at the bat. The Bowling Green, Ohio native looks to cap an illustrious career with another ring.
KSU PLAYER TO WATCH: Josh Johnson, Center Fielder – The graduate student outfielder settled into the leadoff spot this year for the Golden Flashes. At 6-2, Johnson has great size and length which allows him to hit for power and also excel defensively. Johnson hit .405 in league play which was good for third in the league. His OPS ranked third, he was also second in hits and third in home runs. He also led the league in RBI. In Kent State’s balanced offense, he is often coming up in the leadoff spot with guys on base to drive in. Defensively he can cover a lot of ground in the outfield due to that size and length. KSU can follow his lead this week.
HOME SWEET AVON: The Flashes have played well at Crushers Stadium. Of the eight tournaments held here, the Flashes have won three of them (2018, 2014, 2012). Since the tournament hasn’t been in Avon since 2019, nobody has much experience here unless they played here in high school, and some of them did. The artificial turf can play a bit bouncy. Some teams in the MAC play on grass and some play on turf and there can be an adjustment to the playing surface.
SO FRESH AND SO CLEAN: If the Flashes can play clean defensively, they will have as good a chance as anybody to win the tournament. In MAC games this year when the Flashes made one error or less, they were 12-8 and when they made two errors or more, they were 5-5.
THREE REASONS WHY KENT STATE WILL WIN THE MAC TOURNAMENT
- Kent State’s offense is explosive and potent. With it, they are never out of a game. Due to injuries, they have found depth up and down the lineup and guys are contributing that they maybe didn’t think would at the beginning of the year. Their one through nine approach offensively doesn’t let the opposing pitcher take a breath. With stars Josh Johnson and Tim Orr, and the experience and clutch, big game hitting ability of Kyle Jackson and Mike McNamara, the Flashes can get hot and ride the wave to win it all.
- Along with that offense, Kent State is never out of a game. The resilient Flashes have battled back time and time again this year to either come from behind and win, or at least make the game close. Kent State will not wear the role of favorite in this tournament, and perhaps that will allow them to play free and easy and let others tighten up when playing the Flashes.
- Kent State has big game experience and a winning pedigree with many guys on the team who have played in big time atmospheres and environments in both non-conference and conference games. With the sting of last year lingering over their heads, KSU will look to play free and easy this year, without the title of favorites on their back. Jeff Duncan and Mike Birkbeck have navigated this tournament before, and can do it again. When the Flashes are right (see win at Penn State, two wins vs. BGSU), they are a team nobody wants to see in a tournament setting.
THREE REASONS WHY KENT STATE WILL NOT WIN THE MAC TOURNAMENT
- How will Jeff Duncan and Mike Birkbeck navigate the pitching staff this week? Other than Eric Chalus, Kent really doesn’t know what they will get out of their pitching staff. Injuries to the staff have provided opportunities to others, but it’s also made things unclear as to who will do what in a big game atmosphere. Kent State has a team ERA of 5.98 with batters hitting .291 against them this year. How many pitchers can KSU rely on with a game on the line, and how can they try and bridge the gap to Peyton Cariaco with a lead? How will they use Calvin Bickerstaff and Jack Karstonas who have recently come back from injuries?
- Free bases, defensive lapses, errors and mental mistakes have cost the Flashes at times this season. If those things happen this week in Avon, then it doesn’t matter how good an offense is, good teams won’t let you come back in a tournament setting. There have been a lot of free bases given up this year, good teams will make you pay. And those mistakes will end up costing the team if they do in fact occur. You can’t get down 6, 7 or 8 runs in a tournament game and always expect to come back. Kent State is ranked 7th in the MAC in defense, and 5th of all the qualifiers in the tournament.
- The Flashes have been consistently inconsistent this year, and they simply haven’t been good enough, consistently enough. They have had moments, in a mid-week win at Penn State and taking two of three from first place BGSU, where one thought the Flashes were still the top team to be reckoned with. But there’s also been head scratching and frustrating performances as well. Injuries, coupled with inconsistent play, a pitching staff that has an ERA around six and several defensive lapses throughout the season could catch up to them in the end.
FAVORITE: Bowling Green – The Falcons have had a magical season as the top story in the MAC and one of the top stories in the country. The program was almost shut down four years ago before being revived by alums, led by former MLB legend Orel Hershiser. Led by 2011 MAC Pitcher of the Year and former Golden Flash Kyle Hallock as Head Coach, the Falcons can beat you in a variety of ways offensively. With Lorain County native position players (Nathan Archer-Keystone) (Leighton Banjoff-Elyria Catholic) leading the charge combined with the season they’re having, there should be a ton of orange and brown clad Falcons fans at Crushers Stadium in Avon. Will BGSU play with pressure on them to try and be the best team in a three-day span after a long, memorable season or with the confidence and swagger of a team that went 24-6 in the league?
DON’T COUNT OUT: Ball State – As Ball State showed this weekend at Schoonover Stadium, they may be peaking at the right time, scoring a combined 22 runs in wins on Thursday and Friday. The defending tournament champions under legendary coach Rich Maloney, usually have something to say on who wins this thing, if they don’t win it themselves. Second in runs scored and first in home runs hit, combined with really solid starting pitcher could provide a formula along with their experience, for a long stay in Lorain County. The Cardinals started the MAC campaign at 1-7 and went 17-5 the rest of the way.
DARK HORSE: Kent State – It’s weird ever calling Kent State a dark horse in MAC Baseball but when you come in as the #5 seed, you can qualify for that. As mentioned above, Kent State has big game experience, a dynamic lineup and a coaching staff that has navigated this before. They also should have the ability to play free and easy, and let the chips fall where they may in a tournament format, when they’ve shown the ability this year to be a dominate team when all phases are playing well at the same time.
TOP PLAYER: Garret Pike, Toledo – Pike led the league in OPS and Slugging % in conference games only, while also hitting .423 which was good for second in the league. He led the league with 52 hits, was tied for the league lead with 14 home runs and stole 9 bases. He has 40 career home runs, which broke the Toledo career record.
TOP STARTER: Merritt Beeker, Ball State – Beeker was 8-3 this year with a 4.50 ERA and a 116/30 strikeout to walk ratio. A 6-2 junior lefty and an East Carolina transfer, he went 6.1 innings on Thursday against KSU with 11 strikeouts and zero walks. In MAC play he was 7-0 with a 3.12 ERA, with batters hitting .224 off him. He had a 95/17 strikeout to walk ratio in league.
TOP RELIEVER: Peyton Olejnik, Miami – The 6-11, 210-pound right hander and Oklahoma transfer has been electric this year. He’s 8-1 with a 5.01 ERA with 18 appearances, 15 from the bullpen. Miami leverages him well, as he can close a game out or come in during middle relief and give them length in the middle innings. His versatility was on display during the Kent State series when he got a save on Friday and pitched four innings in the Sunday outing.
MAC BASEBALL NOTEBOOK
BACK IN AVON: The MAC Baseball Tournament returns to Avon, Ohio and Crushers Stadium, home of the Lake Erie Crushers. It’s the first time since 2019 that the tournament is in Avon. After no tournaments in 2020 and 2021, campus sites hosted in 2022 (Ball State) and 2023 (Kent State).
FALCONS FLYIN’ IN TO AVON: Bowling Green is rolling into the MAC Tournament as the #1 seed, coming off their first outright regular season championship since 2009. BGSU started the MAC season 17-0, which was the best start in MAC baseball history and the second-best MAC start in BGSU history to the 2020-2021 volleyball team.
“It’s been a long time coming for this program,” BGSU coach Kyle Hallock told the Toledo Blade on May 15. “When you think about four years ago, almost to the day, and where we’re at now, to send the seniors off as champions, it’s storybook. It’s fairy tale.”
BGSU scored 87 more runs than the next team in MAC play. They were second in batting average in MAC play, first in one base percentage, first in walks, and first in slugging percentage, the Falcons can score in a variety of ways. Made up of kids primarily from northwest Ohio and Michigan, the Falcons are largely home grown. They will look to cap off their story book season with a trophy in Avon this week.
BRONCOS BREAKIN’ RECORDS INTO LORAIN COUNTY: Western Michigan has earned the #2 seed, which is their highest seed since 1983. They also broke the program record for strikeouts in a season. Tied for the league lead in pitching with a 5.78 ERA, the Broncos led the MAC in shutouts with five this season.
With 11 seniors on the roster, the Broncos will look to ride that pitching staff, timely hitting and veteran leadership to a title this week.
ROCKETS RIDING THEIR ARMS INTO TOURNEY: The #6 seeded Toledo Rockets will look to ride their arms on the pitching staff to a long stay this week at Crushers Stadium. That staff has an ERA of 5.78 which is tied for the top spot in the league. Starter Grant Umberger, who Jeff Duncan called the top starter in the MAC earlier in the season, has the top ERA in league play at 3.82 and has an opponent batting average at .225.
IF YOU GO: The ticket page at the MAC website is here. All tournament passes and day passes are sold.
HOW TO WATCH: The MAC will stream the entire tournament on ESPN+, and all the Kent State games will air on the Kent State Digital Network via KentStateSports.com and the GoFlashes App. Links to watch, listen and follow along will be available on the baseball schedule page.