TOLEDO, Ohio – The Toledo baseball team will finish out the 2024 regular season with the Battle of I-75 rivalry series against Bowling Green on Thursday-Saturday, May 16-18. Friday's matchup will be held at Fifth Third Field beginning at 7:00 p.m. while Thursday and Saturday will be true road games at Bowling Green starting at 3:00 p.m. All three games will be broadcast live on BCSN and streamed on ESPN+.
 
The Rockets (25-27, 16-11 MAC) crushed Oakland 14-2 in mid-week action in Michigan to sweep the Golden Grizzlies for the season. At Notre Dame over the weekend, UT dropped a 6-5 contest on Friday and an 8-2 decision on Saturday, but rallied to take the series finale, 5-2.
 
Bowling Green (29-18, 21-6 MAC) took 2-of-3 games at Eastern Michigan to clinch the MAC regular season title and a first-round bye in the MAC Tournament.
 
Toledo is in a three-way tie for third place in the MAC standings with Ball State and Kent State, holding the tiebreaker against both schools via series wins. Western Michigan (17-10) is in second place and currently holds the final first-round bye for the MAC tournament.
 
Bowling Green leads the all-time series 47-27 and has taken six of the last nine matchups.
 
LAST WEEKEND
On Friday, Garret Pike hit his 39th and 40th career home runs to set Toledo's all-time home run record. The Rockets held early leads of 2-0 and 3-1, but the Irish rallied to take a 6-3 lead after five innings. Pike and Luke Walton hit back-to-back solo home runs in the eighth, but the comeback bid fell a run short in a 6-5 final.
 
After three scoreless innings, Notre Dame hit home runs in the fourth, fifth and sixth innings to grab a 7-2 lead, as the Rockets' offense stranded 11 runners in an 8-2 final on Saturday.
 
Home runs by Pike, Caden Konczak and JP Wagner accounted for all of UT's scoring in Sunday's 5-2 victory. Jackson Bergman turned in a stellar one-run, three-hit performance in 6.0 innings, as he and Jacob Tabor combined for a four-hitter without a walk.
 
TOLEDO'S MAC HITTING LEADERS

• After hitting 11 home runs last week, Toledo has 86 on the season, which leads the MAC and ranks tied for 33rd in the country. UT's 1.65 home runs per game are 42nd in the nation.
• Garret Pike is now tied for first in the MAC with 20 homers after a four-home run week. Owen Jackson remains in seventh with 15 and Luke Walton is tied for ninth with 12.
• Pike is top 10 in six other categories – second in hits (55) and total bases (145), third in slugging percentage (.694), fourth in runs (55), and seventh in RBIs (52) and average (.359). Pike's 145 total bases are tied for 36th in Division I.
• Jackson's 40 walks are second in the league and tied for a single-season program record.
• Luke Walton has slugged 14 doubles, tied for sixth most in the league.
• Charlie Scholvin has drawn 15 hit-by-pitches, tied for sixth-most in the MAC.

TOLEDO'S MAC PITCHING LEADERS

• Toledo enters the final week of the season tops in the league in ERA (5.89) and opponent batting average (.271). UT is second in the league in strikeouts (456), having reached the most team strikeouts for a single season in program history.
• Grant Umberger ranks fourth in the league with a 3.97 ERA while Johnson Is 13th at 5.89. Umberger holds the league's second-lowest opponent batting average at .230, while Johnson's opponents are batting at a .289 clip, 16th-lowest in the league.
• Umberger has allowed just 33 runs and 56 hits in his 12 starts, the third and fifth-fewest in the league, respectively. Johnson ranks 14th in both runs and hits, allowing just 47 runs and 73 hits on the season.
• Johnson has given up just 19 walks, tied for the MAC's fourth-fewest free passes allowed.
• Umberger's 65.2 innings pitched is ninth-most in the MAC.
• Jacob Tabor recorded his league-leading sixth save on Sunday.

ROCKET NOTES

• Toledo's win over Notre Dame on Sunday was its first win over an ACC opponent since 2015, when it also defeated the Irish.
• Pike enters the weekend with five multi-home run games and seven games of three RBIs or more. He also enters the weekend series on an 11-game hitting streak, hitting .429 (18-for-42) in that stretch.
• Jackson has drawn 17 walks over his last 14 games, including five games with multiple free passes.
• Toledo pitching had a 4.50 ERA last week, allowing just 5.5 hits per game.
• Jackson Bergman has pitched his longest outing of the season and allowed just one run each of his last two times out, going 5.0 innings against Eastern Michigan on May 5 and 6.0 frames against Notre Dame on May 12.
• In his last nine appearances, Tabor has pitched 15.2 innings and allowed just two earned runs for a 1.15 ERA in that span.