UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – The Penn State baseball team released its 2015 schedule, it was announced Monday. The program, which is entering its second season under head coach Rob Cooper, is scheduled to play five teams that reached the 2014 NCAA Tournament.
“We are very excited about the 2015 schedule,” said Cooper. “I strongly believe it is important to challenge our program with as tough of a schedule as possible. I believe this schedule does that, while making our program better. I hope to see Nittany Nation at Medlar Field at Lubrano Park in 2015.”
The Nittany Lions will have five home series and seven midweek games at Medlar Field. In all, Penn State plays 55 games, including 22 at home, 31 on the road and two on a neutral field. The Nittany Lions will be on the road for the first month-plus (19 games) to start the season and are slated to play 24 Big Ten contests.
Of Penn State’s first 15 games, 12 of them will be played in either North or South Carolina. The schedule opens with four games at Elon from Feb. 13-15. The Blue and White then travels to College Station for a three-game series with Texas A&M, an NCAA Tournament team from last season, from Feb. 20-22.
Then, the Nittany Lions compete in the USA Baseball-Irish Classic, hosted by Notre Dame in Cary, North Carolina at the USA Baseball Training Complex. The team’s first game will be at NC State (Feb. 27), before concluding the Classic with games against Cincinnati (Feb. 28) and Notre Dame (March 1).
The next five games will take place in South Carolina. First, the Nittany Lions take on Charleston Southern (March 6-8) in a three-game road swing before playing two midweek games against 2014 NCAA Tournament team South Carolina (March 10-11). The squad then competes in a three-game series at Liberty (March 13-15), also a tournament team last season. The Nittany Lions complete their 19-game road trip with a midweek matchup at Pitt on March 17.
The Big Ten and home slate starts with Indiana, an NCAA Tournament squad a season ago, in a best-of-three showdown from March 20-22. The nine-game home streak continues with Villanova (March 25), Central Connecticut State (March 27-29), Binghamton (March 31) and Kent State (April 1).
Penn State’s first conference road series takes place at Ohio State (April 3-5), before the squad returns home for one game against Bucknell (April 7) and Lafayette (April 8), as well as three against conference-foe Michigan (April 10-12). The Bison also made the NCAA Tournament in 2014.
After playing at West Virginia April 14, the Nittany Lions welcome Bucknell again on April 15.
The Nittany Lions faceoff with Minnesota on the road from April 17-19, before taking on Kent State in Ohio on April 21.
The next seven games are at home, including three against Illinois (April 24-26), one against Pitt (April 29) and three against new conference member Rutgers (May 1-3). The regular season concludes with series at Michigan State (May 8-10) and at Purdue (May 14-16).
The Big Ten Tournament will be held at Target Field, the home of the Minnesota Twins, in Minneapolis, Minnesota from May 20-24.
2015 Penn State Baseball Schedule
