Rider’s lineup off to hot start ahead of series with Oklahoma
LAWRENCEVILLE >> Dr. Barry Davis is in his 19th season guiding the Rider University baseball team, but never in those nearly two decades has he ever had a lineup like this.
From top to bottom, this group of Broncs can mash.
“It’s one of the better offensive teams that I’ve had,” Davis said. “We’ve got some guys up and down the lineup who can do some things. They can hit for power, got some speed, got some balance with a little left-right action.”
Coming off a season in which its reached the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference championship — it may have made it back-to-back NCAA regional appearances had it not run out of pitching during the rain-soaked MAAC Tournament — Rider began its 2023 campaign by taking three of four from Gardner-Webb.
In those four games, the Broncs scored 27 runs, pounded out 41 hits and batted .304. That included a 17-run, 19hit outburst in a 17-2 victory in the series finale.
“I believe it can be one of the best that has ever come through this school,” said senior outfielder Brendan O’Donnell, who had two doubles and a homer over the weekend. “There is a lot of talent up and down and I really do think when we are hot there is no holding this lineup and it’s going to be really tough to face. Once one guy gets going it’s hard not to join in on the rest of the fun.”
O’Donnell is coming off a monster junior season in which he posted a .279/.341/.630 slash with 20 homers and 58 RBI. His 20 longballs set a new Rider record and led the MAAC, while his RBI total was second in the league.
“I can build not only on the home runs, but cutting down on the strikeouts and being more disciplined at the plate,” said, O’Donnell, a 6-foot-3, 220-pound righty out of Great Valley High in Malvern, Pa. “That way I can give myself more opportunities to get into better counts and do some more damage there.”
O’Donnell is just one link in what is a chain of talented offensive players. Also back is tablesetter John Volpe (.281, 4 HR, 9 SB), switch-hitting catcher Socrates Bardatsos (.294, 6 HR, 41 RBI), power-hitting lefty Luke Lesch (.275, 11 HR, 44 RBI) and catcher/DH Brian Skettini (.258, 3 HR, 27 RBI).
“With this lineup having a lot of experience and most of us starting every game last year we have a lot of confidence going into every game, knowing what we are capable of doing,” said Lesch, a Gloucester Catholic product, who has started his season by knocking in seven runs in the first four games. “It’s going to be fun.”
While Rider’s season will ultimately be judged by what happens in MAAC play, this weekend provides a showcase for O’Donnell, Lesch and the rest of a hard-hitting lineup when it visits last season’s NCAA runner-up Oklahoma (22) for a three-game series that begins on Friday at L. Dale Mitchell Park (all games available on ESPN+).
“It’s a great opportunity to showcase what we can do against a great opponent,” O’Donnell said. “I think we got to treat them like everyone else. They go to class, they practice just like us, they put in extra work as well. We got to treat them like another opponent, but we know we got to be tight, we got to be sharp in the field and disciplined at the plate.”
Davis is eager to see how his lineup handles the step-up in competition. He knows the Sooners’ pitching staff will be coming with more velocity than the Broncs see on a daily basis in the MAAC.
“You can feel the confidence and looseness they have,” Davis said. “. They’ve been to a (NCAA) regional and played Louisiana Tech, played Alabama, played Virginia, played West Virginia. We’re not going to go in there and our eyes are going to go ‘ah, what do we do?’ The game itself, anything can happen in these kind of games, so we’re just going to play the best we can.”
Oklahoma is, after all, the type of team Rider wants to be playing against at the end of May because that would mean it had reached the NCAA regionals for the second time in three seasons.
If that happens, this lineup will have a nickname by then.
“I don’t think we have one yet,” O’Donnell said. “It’s still too early, but I think we can definitely get that to you in a couple weeks here.”