Notre Dame baseball began the 2025 campaign with a 2-1 series win in Jacksonville over host North Florida. The Irish claimed a 5-3 victory on Opening Night before splitting the Saturday doubleheader with a 19-6 win in the matinee prior to dropping the finale 8-1.
Head coach Shawn Stiffler enters his third year at the helm in South Bend after a successful, decade-long stint at VCU. The Irish reached the 2022 College World Series the year before Stiffler took the reins, but they have yet to qualify for the NCAA Tournament under his watch.
A member of the ASUN Conference, North Florida has a rich history of baseball pedigree, including a runner-up finish in the 2005 Division II College World Series. Since transitioning to Division I in 2010, the Ospreys have never made the NCAA Tournament, but second-year head coach Joe Mercadante looks to build on last year by returning all three starting pitchers along with welcoming two power bats through the transfer portal from perennial power Florida State.
Opening Day
Sophomore right-hander Jack Radel got the ball to open the 2025 campaign for Notre Dame and retired the first nine batters he faced, carrying over from the success of his freshman season. The Sioux Falls, South Dakota, native struck out 39 batters in his 53 innings of work a year ago and was able to work through four full innings on Friday while allowing just one hit and no runs.
The Irish bats heated up early, as Quinnipiac graduate transfer outfielder Jared Zimbardo gave his team an early advantage with a two-out single in the first in his first at-bat in blue and gold. The Irish would extend the lead to 3-0 in the fourth, as sophomore catcher Carson Tinney belted the first Notre Dame home run of the year before Zimbardo scored on a sacrifice fly from former Virginia transfer and graduate first baseman Connor Hincks.
Tinney recorded another RBI in the fifth with a liner up the middle before freshman outfielder Jayce Lee, a South Bend native, recorded his first career hit to plate junior shortstop Estevan Moreno, making the score 5-0. The Ospreys would attempt to rally back late, but former Brown transfer and graduate right-hander Tobey McDonough slammed the door to pick up his first Notre Dame save in the 5-3 triumph.
Day-two doubleheader
Although originally slated to be a three-day opening set, storms along the Florida coast forced the Sunday finale to be moved to the nightcap of a Saturday doubleheader. Both offenses wasted no time blistering the bats in the afternoon session, as crooked numbers on the scoreboard in the first for North Florida and the third for Notre Dame made it 4-3 Irish. The Ospreys scratched one across in the fifth and were threatening to do more damage, but right-handed sophomore reliever DJ Helwig recorded the backward K to escape the bases-loaded jam.
The Irish carried that momentum into the sixth with an offensive explosion for 10 runs on five hits. Seven of the 10 runs came with two outs in the inning, and the Irish wouldn’t look back from there. Led by freshman infielder Bino Watters’ three-hit, three-walk, four-RBI afternoon and a Moreno grand slam, the Irish claimed the series win with the 19-6 victory in game two.
Both teams struggled with runners in scoring position before North Florida’s five-run seventh inning sealed the 8-1 win. Despite a 3-for-4 game from Zimbardo and 13 strikeouts from the pitching staff, the Irish settled for a 2-1 weekend.
What’s next
The Irish will return to the Sunshine State next weekend for a three-game round robin hosted on the campus of Stetson University in DeLand, Florida. Friday’s opening tilt is set for a 12 p.m. first pitch against Big Ten foe Iowa, before Notre Dame duels against the UMBC Retrievers at the same time on Saturday. The Irish will close out the trip by playing the hosts on Sunday at 1:30 p.m. The 2025 home opener at Frank Eck Stadium is scheduled for Wednesday, March 5, at 4:30 p.m., when Notre Dame will welcome Eastern Michigan.
