Q&A: Penn baseball coach John Yurkow

Penn baseball is off to a blazing 8-0 start in Ivy League play and is riding an 11-game win streak. We caught up with head coach John Yurkow after his squad swept road doubleheaders against Harvard and Dartmouth this past weekend.

Daily Pennsylvanian: You guys are now 8-0 in Ivy play, having won 11 straight [games] . What do you have to say about how well this team is playing and how confident they are?

John Yurkow: They’re playing really well. Twice, we were down on this trip. They were unfazed even though we went down by a few runs. They weren’t worried about it, they came storming right back. There’s just a really good energy in the dugout right now. It’s fun being around them. They’re playing well.

DP: Would you say that the comeback win in game one against Harvard on Saturday gave you some momentum and energy that carried you guys through the weekend?

JY: Absolutely. They’re a pretty good team. They’re well coached and they threw some pretty good arms out there against us. They hopped on us early, but we were able to bounce back pretty quick. Those are signs of a good team.

DP: Can you talk about the importance of getting sweeps on the road, especially given that this is the first time Dartmouth has been swept at Biondi Park (which was built prior to the 2009 season)?

JY: Yeah, that’s the first time that [Dartmouth has] lost a home doubleheader at that park. Any time you can go on the road and beat a team, it demoralizes them a little bit. It’s always gonna be a little tougher on the road. We talk about that all the time — that we need to tighten things up on the road. You’re not gonna get as many calls from the umpires, and you’re playing further up north, so the weather’s gonna be a little colder and windier. We really showed some fight and were able to battle through things this weekend, which was good to see.

DP: Can you talk about the luxury of having Dan Gautieri and Connor Cuff start the earlier games of doubleheaders? It seems like they’re good for a complete game every time.

JY: That’s a huge lift to the staff, because when you’re on the road, you’re limited to your travel roster. You don’t have your full staff when you’re traveling — we had four arms we had to leave at home. It’s critical if you can get those seven inning games for Danny and Connor to go out and throw complete games. It’s a huge lift because you’re gonna need your bullpen more in those nine inning games. We were pretty well rested because of that.

DP: Can you talk about the offensive performance this weekend? Both days it seemed like you were able to get varied contributions both to gain and extend leads.

JY: Mitch Montaldo, he really bounced back. He had a better day [Sunday] with some big hits. Ryan Mincher is slowly raising his average. Him and Mike Vilardo got some big hits for us. His home run in the first game [against Dartmouth on Sunday] was a big one. It got us some momentum and we were able to expand upon it. Rick Brebner is still swinging the bat well. [Connor] Betbeze got a few hits and Brandon Engelhardt is starting to raise his average too. It’s definitely a well-rounded effort. If you’re going to have a good offense that scores a lot of runs, you need to get everybody going and everybody helping out.