How Penn baseball clicked at just the right time to earn a second straight NCAA tournament bid
Though Penn’s regular season record was unimpressive, it still got an opportunity to play playoff baseball. They took advantage, winning the Ivy title, and are back in the NCAA regionals.
In February, Penn was voted the unanimous favorite to repeat as Ivy League baseball champion. But by the final out of its regular season, playoffs weren’t even a certainty.
With a roster plagued by injuries, the Quakers had cobbled together a 11-10 conference record, and their postseason destiny ultimately came down to the final Ivy series between Harvard and Yale. The Crimson needed to win one game to eliminate Yale, and Penn would secure the fourth and final spot in the tournament field.
Harvard pulled off a 3-2 win in the second game of the series, though the Bulldogs were victorious in the other two.
“It was super stressful,” senior pitcher Cole Zaffiro said. “We almost didn’t make it, and now we’re here. So it’s crazy.”
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Without Harvard’s win, Penn wouldn’t have made it to the Ivy tournament last weekend. Penn wouldn’t have won the automatic bid to the NCAAs. And Penn wouldn’t be preparing now for their second-straight regional, looking to build on the history made last year when the Quakers upset Auburn on its own field.
“It’s just been one of those weird years where we’ve had trouble staying healthy,” coach John Yurkow said. “It almost feels better this year, winning it, when I sit back and I look at how much adversity and how hard we had to play to get it done.”
That adversity continued even after the postseason bid became official. A season ago, Penn had hosting rights for the double-elimination Ivy League tournament and blew through the competition, beating Princeton by 13 runs in the championship game. This time around, the Quakers had to fight back from the losers’ bracket after dropping a tournament game to Cornell.
Penn fended off Princeton to stay alive for the championship. That night, the Quakers held a team meeting at their hotel.
Pitchers iced their arms and had deep tissue massages, and they all discussed the task ahead. To win the title, they had to beat undefeated Cornell twice in a row, in what would be their fourth and fifth games of the weekend.
“This is really just going to come down to believing in each other,” Yurkow told his team. “ … There’s no way we’re losing if we win that first game.”
It certainly helped that the Quakers have unanimous Ivy League Player of the Year in third baseman Wyatt Henseler, who is batting .372 and seems to set another program record every game. But in the tournament setting, with so many games in quick succession, pitching depth is critical. It’s also where experience comes into play.
Two of Penn’s typical weekend starters, Zaffiro and junior Ryan Dromboski, returned from last year’s rotation. Carson Ozmer, a senior two-way player, has been a key member of the Quakers’ bullpen for the past three years.
All three pitched in big spots a season ago, with Ozmer and Zaffiro picking up wins in the 2023 regional against Auburn and Samford, respectively. Penn’s coaching staff leaned on them heavily this year to win the conference.
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“This whole tournament, I was gonna throw for as long as [pitching coach Josh] Schwartz let me throw,” said Ozmer. “In a five-game tournament like that, you just got to flush the selfishness and put the team first, deal with the arm consequences later on.”
Ozmer’s 130 total pitches across his two appearances were the most he’s thrown in a single weekend.
Zaffiro entered the opener of the doubleheader in relief on just two days’ rest, after throwing six innings in Penn’s earlier win over host Columbia. In his second appearance, the senior helped lock down an 11-9 win to force the decisive game.
“No matter what the situation is, I know he’s gonna compete and give you everything he has,” Yurkow said. “He’s such a mild-mannered personality. … But he’s one of the best competitors that we’ve ever had here on the mound.”
Facing three consecutive elimination games, the Quakers had to weigh short-term survival while also saving arms for down the line. In addition to the seasoned veterans, pitchers who hadn’t been utilized much this season needed to step up.
Freshman Marty Coyne got the start in Penn’s final game and allowed one earned run to Cornell while striking out three across 3⅔ innings.
“[The freshmen] pitched really well this weekend,” Zaffiro said. “We had pitchers that hadn’t pitched in a while, and just people stepping up and doing their part was huge.”
Though Penn’s regular-season record was unimpressive, that one Harvard run provided the opportunity for playoff baseball — and gave the Quakers a clean slate. They’re taking advantage.
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Penn used 11 different pitchers across the five tournament games. Since the Ivy season ends earlier than most other conferences, they all have some time to rest before learning their regional destiny during the NCAA selection show, scheduled for Monday.
When they do, the Quakers will have the experience from all those elimination games to draw from.
“We’re getting hot. We got hot in the playoffs,” Ozmer said. “I think whichever team we play on Friday night, they’re definitely gonna bring their A game and try to shut us down.”