Sycamores, Penguins come to IU

IU will welcome three teams to the Bloomington regional this weekend in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

The Hoosiers will face Youngstown State in their first game at 7 p.m. Friday.

Youngstown State and Indiana State offer some challenges to IU, which is 30-3 in the past 33 games.

For a breakdown of the Penguins and the Sycamores, read below. For a breakdown of the Stanford Cardinal, read the IDS Q&A with the Stanford Daily’s Jordan Wallach.

Youngstown State Penguins (16-36)

Youngstown State is 20 games below .500 and was the No. 6 seed in its own conference tournament, the Horizon League.

The Penguins knocked off No. 1 seed Wright State in the Horizon League Tournament twice in three days, and they received the conference’s automatic bid.

The Penguins have a rank of No. 270 in the projected RPI of 302 teams, while IU is No. 2.

Youngstown State pulled off the major upset in its own conference tournament, and the team will have to pull off an even bigger upset against the Hoosiers in the first round matchup.

Lefty Jared Wight will get the start on Friday for the Penguins. In 16 appearances this year, Wight has a 6.97 ERA in 40 innings pitched.

Wight is 1-3 and has walked more than he has struck out. Who Wight will go up against for the Hoosiers is still in flux.

IU Coach Tracy Smith said he will probably keep ace Joey DeNato until later in the weekend.

“We’re still trying to figure out what we’re doing Friday,” Smith said. “I think the good part for us is we have a lot of confidence in the other guys.”

On the offensive side of the ball, the Penguins have two players who have hit more than .300 this season. Second baseman Phil Lipari has been on a tear during the later stretch of the season.

As recent as April 27, Lipari was hitting just .236. In the past 15 games Lipari is 30-for-65, good for a .462 average that has bumped his season average to .322.

Indiana State Sycamores (35-16)

The Sycamores are the only team in the Bloomington regional that IU has played this season.

The two teams split the season series. Indiana State took a 12-8 bout March 26 in Terre Haute, and the Hoosiers got revenge with a 8-4 win April 9 in Bloomington.

Indiana State is coming off a strong regular season, where it finished 14-7 in the Missouri Valley Conference, but the Sycamores followed that with a lackluster performance in the conference tournament, where they went 0-2.

They received an at-large bid mainly because of their RPI, which was No. 22 in the nation.

On the offensive side, Mike Fitzgerald and Derek Hannahs are the only Sycamores who are hitting more than .300 on the year.

Fitzgerald also has an on-base percentage of .461, which is the highest on the team. He is usually the team’s cleanup hitter, batting fourth in the lineup.

Three Sycamore pitchers have thrown more than 70 innings this year, and each have an ERA less than 3.50.

Stanford and Indiana State play the first game of the regional at 2 p.m. Friday.