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CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – Harvard University baseball opens its 2024 season with a three-game series against Troy University at Riddle-Pace Field in Troy, Alabama from Feb. 23-25 (ESPN+), coming off a 2023 season in which the Crimson qualified for the inaugural Ivy League Tournament as the conference’s No. 2 seed.

What to Know

• The series – and Harvard’s 2024 season – opens with game one on Friday, Feb. 23 at 7:00 p.m. ET (6:00 p.m. CT) prior to game two on Saturday, Feb. 24 at 4:30 p.m. ET (3:30 p.m. CT) and game three on Sunday, Feb. 25 at 1:00 p.m. ET (noon CT).
• Harvard’s weekend rotation will feature RHP Sean Matson (3-5, 5.02 ERA | 2023 Stats) in game one, RHP Tanner Smith (2-0, 5.50 ERA | 2022 Stats) in game two, and RHP Callan Fang (2-3, 4.66 ERA | 2023 Stats) in game three. Troy will counter with RHP Grayson Stewart in game one, LHP Logan Ross in game two, and RHP Clete Hartzog in game three.
• Harvard will meet Troy – a 2023 NCAA tournament team – for the first time in program history this weekend.
• Harvard will play its first 17 games of the season on the road. The Crimson makes four trips to the South, facing Troy (Feb. 23-25), The Citadel (Mar. 1-3), Penn State in Cary, North Carolina (Mar. 8-10), ETSU (Mar. 13), and Western Carolina (Mar. 15-17) before returning to the Northeast for road contests at Columbia (Mar. 23-24) and Holy Cross (Mar. 26). The Crimson will play its first home games vs. Brown (Mar. 30-31).
• Harvard University baseball was selected to finish third in the 2024 Ivy League Baseball Preseason Media Poll. The Crimson totaled 97 points to land in the top half of the eight-team poll. Penn took the top spot with 128 points and 16 first-place votes. Columbia (101 points) and Princeton (87 points) claimed the second and fourth spots respectively. Yale (66 points), Cornell (37), Brown (35), and Dartmouth (25) rounded out the fifth through eighth spots in the poll.
• Harvard returns several key hitters to its lineup from the 2023 season, including junior George Cooper (.333 average, 13 doubles), senior Jake Berger (.292 average, 32 RBIs), senior Ben Rounds (.290 average, 33 RBIs), and senior Peter Messervy (.280 average, 16 doubles).
• On the mound, Harvard brings back junior right-hander Sean Matson – the Most Outstanding Relief Pitcher award winner in the Cape Cod Baseball League in 2023 – and sophomore right-hander Callan Fang – the 2023 Ivy League Rookie of the Year.
• Senior infielder Jake Berger will serve the Crimson as a captain for the 2024 season following a vote of the team’s student-athletes. In 2023, Berger earned a spot on the Ivy League All-Tournament Team and gained selection to the NEIBA New England All-Star Game.
• Harvard earned the ABCA Team Academic Excellence Award for the seventh straight year for its achievements in the classroom during the 2022-23 academic year.
• Highlights from the Crimson’s schedule include four trips to the South, including two series in North Carolina, one in Alabama, and one in South Carolina, its first Ivy series at Columbia (Mar. 23-24), its home-opening series against Brown (Mar. 30-31), The Baseball Beanpot, the final series of the regular season at home vs. Yale (May 11-12), and a hopeful berth in the four-team Ivy League Tournament (May 17-20).
• In 2023, the Crimson gained a berth in the inaugural Ivy League Tournament, securing the No. 2 seed behind a 15-6 Ivy League record, marking Harvard’s most Ivy League wins since 2005. The Crimson captured six of its seven Ivy League series during the regular season.
• Harvard featured a pair of draft picks in the 2023 MLB Draft as right-hander Chris Clark went to the Los Angeles Angles in the fifth round before right-hander Jay Driver went to the Cleveland Guardians in the ninth round. 

Up Next

Harvard plays a three-game series at The Citadel in Charleston, South Carolina from Mar. 1-3 (ESPN+) with game one on Mar. 1 at 5:00 p.m., game two on Mar. 2 at 2:00 p.m., and game three on Mar. 3 at 1:00 p.m.