Spartans battling Boilermakers in first visit to West Lafayette since 2019.
| MICHIGAN STATE (14-16, 3-3 B1G) at PURDUE (20-13, 5-4 B1G) | |
| Location | Alexander Field || West Lafayette, Ind. |
| Tickets | Purdue Ticket Office |
| Weather | College Park: Fri: 58° / 40° | Sat: 68° / 57° | Sun: 80° / 52° |
| Game Notes | MICHIGAN STATE | PURDUE |
| Social Media |
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| Television | None |
| Game 1 | Friday, April 12 - 6 p.m. ET |
| Probable Pitching Match-Up | PUR: #37 GR LHP Jordan Morales (4-3, 4.00 ERA) MSU: #16 SO LHP Joseph Dzierwa (3-1, 2.98 ERA) |
| Coverage | Live Stats | Watch Live | Listen Live (PUR Broadcast) |
| Game 2 | Saturday, April 13 - 3 p.m. ET |
| Probable Pitching Match-Up | PUR: #4 SR LHP Luke Wagner (4-0, 4.93 ERA) MSU: #46 SR LHP Nick Powers (5-2, 3.27 ERA) |
| Coverage | Live Stats | Watch Live | Listen Live (PUR Broadcast) |
| Game 3 | Sunday, April 14 - 1 p.m. ET |
| Probable Pitching Match-Up | PUR: #18 SR LHP Jonathan Blackwell (2-2, 5.01 ERA) MSU: #37 GR RHP Nick Ferazzi (0-2, 5.10 ERA) |
| Coverage | Live Stats | Watch Live | Listen Live (PUR Broadcast) |
• After a weekend hiatus from league play, Michigan State baseball resumes Big Ten Conference action with a three-game weekend series at Purdue, Friday-Sunday, April 12-14 at Purdue's Alexander Field in West Lafayette, Ind. ... The series opens on Friday at 6 p.m. ET, followed by Saturday's game two at 3 p.m. ET and Sunday's series finale at 1 p.m. ET.
• The Spartans' schedule is subject to change, stay tuned to MSUSpartans.com and @MSUBaseball on X/Twitter for schedule updates.
• Fans can follow this weekend's action with "Watch Live," "Live Stats" and "Listen Live" links, where available, at MSUSpartans.com.
• For the eighth-straight year, the Spartan Media Network will carry a live audio stream for all home and select road Spartan baseball games this season ... The broadcast will be available exclusively at MSUSpartans.com by clicking on "Listen Live" on the baseball schedule ... Broadcast veteran Scott Moore calls the action, with Spartan baseball alum Jim Cotter providing analysis ... There will be no Spartan Media Network broadcast from Purdue, but the "Listen Live" link will be for Purdue's broadcast.
COACH VAN AMEYDE AWAY FROM TEAM
• Michigan State will be without veteran pitching coach Mark Van Ameyde (VAN-uh-mead) for an extended amount of time, as he will be away from the team after undergoing a successful kidney transplant on March 20.
HOME STATERS
• The Spartans have 22 players on its 2024 roster from the state of Michigan, while the Boilermakers have 13 Indiana natives on their roster.
SPARTANS FROM INDIANA
• Michigan State has one player from the state of Indiana: junior designated hitter/catcher Christian Williams (Carmel/Carmel HS) ... Purdue senior outfielder Weston Gingerich is one of the 13 Indiana natives on the Boilermakers' roster and is also from Carmel (Guerin Catholic).
MICHIGANDER BOILERMAKERS
• Purdue has two players from the state of Michigan on its roster in graduate catcher Aaron Dolney (Plymouth/Detroit Country Day HS/Eastern Michigan) and freshman pitcher Easton Storey (Brighton/Brighton HS)
MSU VS. INDIANA TEAMS
• This weekend's series against Purdue will be MSU's fifth of six different opponents from the state of Indiana on the Spartans' 2024 regular-season schedule, having played six games against teams from Indiana and had another rained out ... Michigan State enters this weekend 3-3 against Indiana teams, as MSU has already played Ball State (L, 4-1, on Feb. 18 in Charleston, S.C.) and Indiana State (L, 7-6 (10 inn.) in Port Charlotte, Fla. ... the Spartans won the three-game series with Evansville (March 15-17), taking the opener, 11-3, before dropping game two, 5-3 in 11 inn., but then bouncing back to win the series with a 6-5 Victory for MSU ... Michigan State also beat Purdue Fort Wayne, 11-1 in 8-innings via run-rule ... MSU was scheduled to take on Notre Dame on April 2 at South Bend, but it got rained out and no make-up date has been announced yet, but the Spartans and Irish are scheduled to meet April 30 at East Lansing ... MSU also plays one of the two Big Ten teams from Indiana this season, playing at Purdue this weekend in West Lafayette, but does not play Indiana during the regular-season.
BOSS 800
• Tuesday's game vs. Central Michigan was MSU head coach Jake Boss Jr.'s 800th game at the helm of the Spartans, becoming the third MSU baseball head coach to coach 800 games leading the Spartans, joining John Kobs and Danny Litwhiler.
Coach Years Gms. W L T Pct.
John H. Kobs 1935-63 (39) 969 576 377 16 .603
Daniel W. Litwhiler 1964-82 (19) 859 489 362 8 .574
Jake Boss Jr. 2009-pres. (16th) 800 430 370 0 .538
LAST TIME OUT LOOK BACK
• Michigan State was shutout by Central Michigan, 10-0, in 7 innings via the run-rule on Tuesday, April 9, just one day off from being one year to the day of MSU's last run-rule loss, coming on April 8, 2023 vs. Ohio State, losing 13-2 in 7 innings in game 1 of a doubleheader, bouncing back to win the nightcap, 16-3 in 7 innings, for an alternating run-rule doubleheader result.
• MSU was shutout for just the second time this season and both times the Spartans had five or fewer hits, with five hits Tuesday, and three hits in a 2-0 loss to Lehigh on Feb. 17 in Charleston, S.C.
LAST WEEKEND SHUT OUT RECAP
• Michigan State blanked Niagara, 9-nil in the opener of last weekend's series opener, as MSU posted its first shutout since March 20, 2022 when the Spartans beat Houston Baptist, 1-0.
• Spartan starter sophomore southpaw Joseph Dzierwa went 7.0 IP, before senior reliever Aaron Mishoulam (1.0 IP) and freshman reliever Garrett Brewer (1.0 IP) finished it off for the combined shutout ... in the last blanking, three Spartans pitchers also combined for the shutout as well, with Nick Powers (6.1 IP), Andrew Carson (1.2 IP), Kyle Bischoff (1.0 IP) vs. Houston Baptist, March 20, 2022.
• Dzierwa was dominant, as he tied his career-high for third time this season with nine strikeouts in 7.0 IP as MSU snapped hot-hitting Niagara's eight-game win streak Friday.
• He retired 11-straight Niagara batters with six strikeouts in that span, covering the first through the fourth innings.
• After allowing two singles to open the game, Dzierwa got out of the inning with a flyout, then back-to-back Ks ... He opened the second with two more strikeouts in a row for four in a row, part of the 11-straight retired Purple Aces, until a single in the top of the fourth.
• Dzierwa, Mishoulam and Brewer combined to stymie Niagara's bats as they came into game ranking No. 16 in the NCAA with a team average of .321, averaging over 11 hits and nine runs per game, and were held in check to five hits and no runs Friday night ... Two Purple Eagles were in the top 15 in the nation in average, as Eric Rataczak was No. 13 at .446, while Nick Monile was hitting .438 coming into Friday ... They were a combined 1-for-8 with a strikeout apiece, with Monile lacing a two-out single in the fourth for the lone hit between them ... Rataczak had a season-long 13-game hitting streak snapped by going hitless for just the fourth time this season.
PUTTIN' THE SWEET IN HOME SWEET HOME
• Michigan State is off to a 7-5 ledger at home after winning the home-opening series over Evansville March 15-17, winning two of three, and beating Purdue Fort Wayne on March 19, before losing to Oakland on March 27 ... MSU went 17-4 at home last season and the Spartans have now won 30 of their last 42 home games (30-12) in their last 42 home games dating back to the 2022 season.
POWERS NO. 125 ON D1BASEBALL'S TOP 150 STARTING PITCHERS
• Senior left-handed starting pitcher Nick Powers is No. 125 on D1Baseball.com's Top 150 Starting Pitchers and is the lone Spartan representative on the publication's mid-season player rankings.
• Powers leads MSU with a 2.57 ERA, logging a 4-2 record in seven starts, including one complete game ... he has 36 strikeouts to just seven walks, yielding 16 runs, 14 earned, in 49.0 IP.
• Powers is fifth in the B1G and 61st in the NCAA in strikeout-to-walk ratio (5.14), while ranking third in the league in both wins (4) and walks allowed per nine innings (1.29), along with fourth in WHIP (1.08).
FRANK-ING FAST ON THE BASEPATHS AND UP THE RECORD BOOK
• Senior outfielder Jack Frank snagged three stolen bases in the weekend series vs. Niagara, now with 16 on the season and 49 stolen bases for his career ... with the 49 swipes, Frank has climbed within one of No. 5 on MSU's career stolen bases, one shy of Brandon Hughes (2015-17).
• Frank is also third in the B1G and 39th in the NCAA with the 16 stolen bases ... he also is fourth in the conference and 46th in the country in stolen bases per game (0.53).
• The 16 swipes is just three shy of his single-season career-high of 19 stolen bases last season, and is his third-straight double-digit swipes season after 10 in 2022.
SPARTANS VS. BOILERMAKERS SERIES NOTES
MSU making first trip to West Lafayette since 2019 ... The Spartans have won the last two three-game series played in West Lafayette as part of winning the last six three-game series, including taking last year's series in East Lansing in both teams' B1G openers ... Purdue won the opener on March 24, before game two was postponed until March 26 for a doubleheader, with MSU winning both, 5-4 and 12-6 ... Prior to last season's meeting, the Spartans welcomed Purdue to East Lansing in 2021, when MSU hosted Purdue and Penn State during the COVID-19 pandemic altered schedule of only a Big Ten Conference-only ledger in 2021, with some weekends featuring three-team pod play ... Michigan State hosted Purdue and Penn State on April 9-12 and played Purdue and Illinois in Champaign, Ill., on April 16-18 during the 2021 season ... The Spartans and Boilermakers have alternated win streaks in the series, with MSU winning the last two after Purdue won the previous four, that came on the heels of a three-game Spartan win streak in the series ... overall, MSU leads the all-time series, 87-77, while the series is level at 41-41 in games played at West Lafayette, with MSU winning four of the last six match-ups at Alexander Field winning the last six three-game series since Purdue's last series win in 2012 in West Lafayette, a year after Michigan State was the last team two sweep a three-game set in the all-time series, winning all three in 2011 in East Lansing ... Purdue was the last team in the series to post a sweep in West Lafayette doing so in 1987, back when the teams played four-game series, doing so until 2006, before shifting to playing three-game series in 2007.
ABOUT PURDUE
• The Boilermakers are 20-13 overall and 5-4 in B1G action ... Purdue is coming off a 9-3 loss to Indiana State on Tuesday night, as ISU pulled away from a 2-2 tie entering the eighth inning with a three-run eighth and four runs in the ninth before the Boilermakers added a run in the ninth ... the Indiana State loss snapped a four-game win streak for Purdue, as the Boilermakers swept Rutgers last weekend in Piscataway, N.J., winning the opener, 5-3 in 10-innings, before capturing the series with an 8-6 triumph and completed the sweep with a 5-3 in on Sunday.
• Purdue is hitting .283 as a team, with 317 hits (9.6 pg) and 254 runs (7.7 pg), with 32 HR ... the Boilermakers also have 50 stolen bases (1.5 pg).
• Redshirt-freshman catcher/first baseman Luke Gaffney leads Purdue and ranks third in the B1G and 63rd in the NCAA in batting average at .395 ... Gaffney also shares the team-lead and ranks tied for second in the conference and 50th in the country in RBI (39) ... He's also ranked second in the B1G and 27th in the NCAA in hits (51), in addition to ranking fourth in the league and 34th in the nation in hits per game (1.6) ... Gaffney is second on the team in HR (6), while tied for second on the team in both doubles (10) and triples (2).
• Senior catcher Connor Caskenette is tied with Gaffney with the 39 RBI, while adding a team-high seven HR.
• Redshirt-sophomore infielder Camden Gasser leads Purdue and ranks fifth in the B1G in stolen bases (13), while fifth-year outfielder Mike Bolton Jr. is seventh with 11.
• On the mound, Friday's starter is graduate left-hander Jordan Morales, who has a 4-3 record with a 4.00 ERA, ranking seventh in the B1G in strikeout-to-walk ratio (4.3) ... Morales has 43 Ks to just 10 BB in 45.0 IP in eight starts, allowing a .291 average to the opposition.
• Saturday's starter is senior southpaw Luke Wagner, who is 4-0 with a 4.93 ERA, logging 31 Ks to 11 BB in 38.1 IP, with a .340 BAA.
• Senior lefty Jonathan Blackwell is Sunday's probable starter, with a 2-2 mark and a 5.01 ERA, also with 31 strikeouts and 11 walks in 32.1, with the opposition hitting .258 against him.
• Senior righty reliever Jackson Dannelley leads the B1G with five saves, logging an 0-3 record with 4.66 ERA, ringing up 31 Ks to 15 BB, while stymieing the opposition bats to the tune of just .180, and had been a part of both of Purdue's shutouts.
• Purdue head coach Greg Goff is in his fifth year engineering the Boilermakers with a 96-96 mark in West Lafayette, and has a 422-435-1 all-time career record in his 19th season as a head coach.
SPARTANS VS. SOUTHPAWS
• Michigan State is slated to be facing three left-handed starters, as all three of Purdue's probable starters are southpaws ... MSU is currently 4-7 against lefty starters.
COMMON OPPONENTS
• Michigan State and Purdue have two common opponents in Rutgers and Indiana State, and would have a third in Notre Dame, as the Boilermakers lost to their in-state foes Fighting Irish, 11-2 on March 5, but MSU's game at Notre Dame scheduled for April 2 was rained out ... MSU lost to Indiana State on 7-6 in 10-innings on Feb. 23 in Port Charlotte, Fla., while Purdue has played Indiana State twice, losing 8-7, on March 26 in Terre Haute, and lost to the then No. 18th-ranked Sycamores, 9-3, this past Tuesday in West Lafayette ... The Spartans took two of three from Rutgers in a three-game B1G weekend series March 29-31, dropping the opener, 4-2, before winning game two, 5-2, and the rubber match, 3-2 ... The Boilermakers went out to Piscataway, N.J., and swept the Scarlet Knights, winning 5-3 in 10-innings in game one, 8-6 in game two, and completing the sweep with a 5-3 in on Sunday.
Preview courtesy of MSU Athletics.
