The University of Louisville baseball team will travel to California for a three-game series against Cal beginning Friday, April 16. All games are scheduled to be televised on ACC Network Extra, with radio coverage available throughout the weekend on 970 WGTK and additional broadcasts on 93.9 The Ville for Saturday and Sunday.
This West Coast trip marks only the third time under head coach Dan McDonnell that Louisville has played in California. Previous trips included a Super Regional appearance at Cal State Fullerton in 2009 and a series at Pepperdine in 2011, followed by midweek games at USC during that same visit.
The Cardinals recently secured a win over Western Kentucky, scoring seven runs early and holding off their opponent for a final score of 7-3. Jake Bean pitched five innings allowing just one run, while Drew Freeman hit his first career home run.
In terms of conference performance, Louisville holds an all-time record of 62-43-2 in Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) series since joining the league. The team has also shown increased activity on the basepaths recently, recording at least three stolen bases in six of its last seven games for a total of thirty during that span.
Individually, freshman Tague Davis set the program’s freshman home run record with eighteen this season and currently leads the nation with sixty-six runs batted in (RBIs). Zion Rose has contributed significantly when healthy, batting .431 across fifteen starts this year while going perfect in stolen base attempts. Bayram Hot leads the team with a .391 average after transferring from Marist last season and ranks among ACC leaders in several offensive categories. On the mound, Ethan Eberle made notable progress as a freshman by moving into a starting role and achieving double-digit strikeouts multiple times.
Louisville previously met Cal only once before last year’s weekend series at Jim Patterson Stadium; they won two out of three games against Cal last spring under McDonnell’s leadership.
