Four games remain until Notre Dame baseball, currently at 5-1, enters the gauntlet known as the ACC schedule. The Irish, before taking on Eastern Michigan in Wednesday’s home opener, will travel to Nashville and battle Belmont in their last non-conference weekend series until May.
Notre Dame’s 5-1 mark is its best through a season’s first six games since Shawn Stiffler arrived as head coach in 2023. After taking two out of three games on opening weekend at North Florida, the Irish swept last weekend’s Stetson Tournament, defeating Iowa in 11 innings before blowing out UMBC and Stetson.
Irish pitching, which has outputted a respectable earned run average of 3.63 thus far, starred last weekend by conceding only five runs across 28 innings. Freshman right-hander Jack Radel delivered again on Friday against the Hawkeyes, twirling five innings of one-run baseball. His opposing batting average sits at an impressive .129 through two starts. The success of graduate righty Jackson Dennies on Saturdays has been a huge development, as the burly Louisianan turned 5.1 walk-free innings with eight strikeouts against UMBC. Junior right-hander Rory Fox was perfect behind him on Sunday, striking out four and allowing zero baserunners against Stetson.
The Irish bullpen was good, too, particularly in Friday’s close win. Senior Ricky Reeth, freshman Chase Van Ameyde and graduate student Tobey McDonough combined to toss five scoreless frames with the game tied 1-1 before McDonough sealed the win in the 11th. Van Ameyde and McDonough returned on Sunday to deal three scoreless innings, with freshman Kellan Klosterman punching out three in a shutout frame between them.
Six games into last season, the Irish had given up 40 runs. This year, they’ve allowed only 22.
While returners have mostly anchored Notre Dame’s pitching staff, newcomers have driven its offense. Freshman infielders Bino Watters and Parker Brzustewicz are two of the team’s top three run producers with six and five runs batted in, respectively. Brzustewicz has multiple hits in all three games at Stetson, while Watters bounced back from an 0-for-5 on Friday to collect three hits on Sunday. Graduate outfielder Jared Zimbardo, who moved into the leadoff spot on Saturday, has also made an impact since coming over from Quinnipiac University. He reached base multiple times in each game over the weekend and has a slash line of .429/.538/.476 with a team-high three stolen bases through six games.
Junior shortstop Estevan Moreno, the team’s top position player entering the season, had an 0-for-13 weekend, but he’ll be happy to see the calendar flipping to March on Saturday. Last year, he posted two games with three home runs within the first five days of March.
Belmont’s bad start
A road sweep shouldn’t be out of the question this weekend for Notre Dame. The Bruins, since winning the Ohio Valley Conference’s regular-season title, have been mediocre, and that’s continued into the first two weeks of 2025. Belmont lost each of its first seven games to start head coach Dave Jarvis’s 28th season, getting swept at home by Kentucky. However, the Bruins got on the board with Tuesday’s 14-9 victory at Lipscomb.
In Tuesday’s Battle of the Boulevard victory in Nashville, the Bruins started fast with multiple runs scored in each of the first three innings. Each of Belmont’s nine hitters reached base, with third and fourth hitters Ty Allen and Landon Godsey doing serious damage at the plate. The two each went deep, combining for seven hits, nine RBIs and four runs scored to push the Bruins over the top. Belmont’s pitching and defense, however, were spotty, as the Bisons produced nine runs on 11 hits, six walks and three Belmont errors.
Overall, Allen as a sophomore leads the Bruins in a number of categories, including batting average (.394), on-base percentage (.444), slugging percentage (.727), hits (13), home runs (three), RBIs (11) and runs scored (eight). Pete Daniel and Godsey, one of the team’s 20 newcomers, have also hit better than .300 through eight games.
On the mound, Notre Dame can expect to face junior right-hander Will Pryor on Friday. Last year’s team leader in strikeouts fared well against Kentucky last week, punching out four and allowing one earned run in six innings of a game Belmont lost 2-1. Joe Ruzicka, a junior right-hander and an All-Missouri Valley Conference Honorable Mention last year, should go on Saturday. He struggled against Kentucky, giving up five runs in four innings. Redshirt sophomore right-hander Jake Timbes, who hasn’t yet pitched into the fourth inning, has started each of Belmont’s first two Sunday games.
Notre Dame has faced Belmont just once previously, defeating the Bruins at a neutral site in Georgia in 2015. The Irish will play ball this weekend at 5 p.m. on Friday and at 1 p.m. on both Saturday and Sunday.
