May 17, 2006

Washington, D.C - The Georgetown University baseball team travels to the University of Pittsburgh for a three-game BIG EAST series. The teams will square off at Trees Field on Thursday, May 18 at 7 p.m. before single games on Friday, May 19 and Saturday, May 20 which start at noon.

Six of the eight seeds in next week's BIG EAST Tournament have already been established. Cincinnati (11-13), USF (10-14), the Hoyas (9-15), Villanova (8-15) and Pittsburgh (8-16) are all still fighting for the final two playoff spots.

Georgetown is currently in ninth place in the league standings, one game behind USF. If Georgetown and USF finish with the same league record, Georgetown would finish ahead of the Bulls because the Hoyas won two of three at USF earlier this season.

Georgetown has dropped four straight games including last weekend's three-game sweep to Rutgers.

The Hoyas have won nine BIG EAST games for the first time since the 1986 season which was also the last time GU qualified for the BIG EAST Tournament.

Sophomore infielder Matthew Bouchard (E. Greenwich, R.I./Bishop Hendricken) has been one of the hottest hitters in the league. In the last 13 games, Bouchard is batting .400 (20-50) with seven extra base hits, eight walks and nine RBI, including his first career home run in Sunday's game with Rutgers.

Mark McLaughlin (Walnut Creek, Calif./De La Salle) leads all BIG EAST players with 23 stolen bases and ranks seventh on the circuit with 34 walks.

Ryan Craft (Jupiter, Fla./The Benjamin School) ranks fourth in the league with 18 doubles and ranks second on the team with 33 RBI.

Freshman righty Darren Sizemore (Hamilton, Ohio/Ross) ranks among the league's leaders with 77.1 innings pitched. Sizemore has a team-best six victories and 55 strikeouts. Junior reliever Mark Dutmers (Sarasota, Fla./Riverview) ranks seventh in the Conference with 24 appearances and opponents are batting .238 vs. the lefty.

In his last ten games, junior catcher Brandon Davis (Poway, Calif./The Bishop's School) is hitting .324 with a slugging percentage of .676. Davis has driven in a team-high 11 RBI during the span with four doubles and three of his four homers on the season.

The Hoyas are 9-2 in one-run games and 4-0 in one-run games vs. BIG EAST opponents.

Cincinnati plays at St. Johns, USF is at West Virginia and Villanova hosts Notre Dame in other meaningful BIG EAST action this weekend.