If the end-of-the-year doubleheaders between Penn and Princeton were going to mean anything this season, Ivy League baseball buffs would have probably said that it was the Quakers who would be fighting to move up.
But when the Tigers roll into Meiklejohn Stadium this weekend, they'll be the underdogs at two games back in the division.
And it's Penn, in fact, that sits atop the Gehrig Division with an opportunity to clinch this weekend. Fittingly, the Quakers will have to do it against their archrivals and the defending Ivy champions.
While the scenarios are complex, if Penn (17-14, 9-5 Ivy) takes three out of four games from Princeton it can lock up the division with minimal help from Cornell, who is tied with Princeton for second place.
But as pre-game preparation goes, the Tigers are taking a rather relaxed approach.
According to coach Scott Bradley, Princeton has done "no scouting whatsoever" despite never having seen Penn's likely day-one starters - freshmen Todd Roth and Jim Birmingham - in action before.
"Our preparation is really pretty simple," he added. "There's no pre-determined scouting report, there's no strategy involved other than, 'It's baseball.' It's not something where we're spending hours . getting through videotape and everything else."
But that's not to say Bradley isn't concerned.
"After the Columbia weekend" three weeks ago, he said, "they've no doubt been the best team in this league."
While Penn coach John Cole doesn't lose too much sleep pouring over scouting reports either, he seems to have a better idea of what he's getting into.
Cole stressed that, although they have power in their lineup, Princeton's hitters are not the running type, with a meager 15 stolen bases this season.
The Tigers (10-19, 6-6) boast a pair of sluggers in infielder-catcher Sal Iacono, who carries a .400 average to go with a 1.075 on-base-plus-slugging average and 27 RBI, and left fielder Greg Van Horn, who hits leadoff despite his .580 slugging percentage and three home runs.
But what concerns Cole most is Princeton's arms, not its bats.
"They have some pretty good pitching," he said.
The Tigers' rotation is led by righthanders David Hale, Eric Walz and Steven Miller, who all carry ERAs under 4.42.
While Bradley said that Miller and righty Christian Staehely will take their turns and start tomorrow's games, the starting spots for Sunday's doubleheader are more up in the air. Because Princeton had to make up a doubleheader against Columbia on Wednesday, the rest of the pitching staff has been thrown a bit out of whack.
Roth and Birmingham will certainly start for Penn, but the other two spots are also a little ambiguous, leaving seniors Doug Brown and Joe Thornton as the leading candidates to start the other two contests.
And even though Bradley is going into this one relatively blind, he cited the Red and Blue's hurlers as a cause for worry.
"I know their pitching has been very, very good," Bradley said. "Especially first day with Roth and Birmingham, [that] really enabled them to get off to a good start each weekend."
The Saturday matchups of the Quakers' aces against the Tigers' third and fourth starters is certainly favorable to Penn, but Cole, for one, is making sure not to get ahead of himself.
Even though the Quakers can lock up a league title shot this weekend, their coach is trying to remain blissfully unaware.
"We'll play one game at a time," Cole said, "and try to get as many wins as we can."
