Bracket Breakdown: No. 3 seed Rhode Island

(Photo Credit: Rhode Island Athletics)

By Hunt Palmer

After a year off, Alex Box Stadium will host another regional this coming weekend. LSU earned the No. 6 national seed and will play host to No. 2 seed Dallas Baptist, No. 3 seed Rhode Island and No. 4 seed Little Rock beginning on Friday afternoon.

The three visiting teams will arrive on Wednesday, and all four team have a scheduled practice at the stadium on Thursday.

In this series, we’ll break down all four squads in depth. We continue with the No. 3 seed Rhode Island.

HOW’D THEY GET HERE?

The Rams won the Atlantic 10 regular season with a 22-8 record. Then they swept through the tournament with three straight wins.

This club gets off the bus and hits. We’ll talk about pitching later, but they got to this region based on offense.

Rhode Island only played five Quadrant 1 games this year, and four of them came at Oregon Feb 21-23. They won a slugfest in the first game, 12-11. In game two Oregon shut them out and won 1-0. Another offensive matchup ended with Oregon winning 19-12, and the Ducks controlled the finale 15-2.

The rest of the schedule was extremely light, and that’s why Rhode Island carries the lowest RPI of any three seed in the tournament.

WHY THEY’LL ADVANCE

The offense is explosive on paper. The Rams rank ninth in the country in runs per game at 9.1. They’re seventh in on base percentage (.430), 25th in walk rate and 20th in fewest strikeouts.

They’ve got four hitters with double-digit homers and three with 20-plus steals.

Anthony DePino, a senior infielder, leads the Rams’ charge offensively. He’s hitting .359 with a team-best 19 home runs. Before on 0-4 in the conference tournament final, DePino had 13 hits in a five-game span. He hits leadoff, never strikes out and can beat you with the long ball.

I’ve mentioned a lot of offense, correct?  Well, in the advancement portion of this we also have to mention left-hander Trystan Levesque. He’s been sensational for Rhode Island, leading the team in almost every pitching statistic.

Remember that Oregon series above where the Ducks scored 45 runs over three games and one in the fourth? Levesque fired 10 scoreless innings in his start. He allowed three hits and struck out nine.

He earned a weekend rotation spot in 2022 as a sophomore and had a great junior season when he struck out 101 hitters as the Saturday arm. Last season a hamstring issue cost him the year, but he’s returned in 2024 and been great.

The Rams have won 10 of his last 12 starts, and for the season Levesque has 90 strikeouts in 88.2 innings. He’s only walked 23 and allowed just four homers.

Closer Joe Sabbath has had a nice year, as well. He’s made 27 appearances out of the bullpen and sports an ERA of 3.11. He’s got 40 strikeouts in 37.2 innings and has only surrendered one homer. Opponents hit .203 off of the 6-foot-2 right-hander.

Levesque and Sabbath arm quality arms to go with a potent lineup.

WHY THEY WON’T

After Levesque and Sabbath, it’s not pretty on the mound.

Junior Jeremy Urena is their second starter. He’s a 6-foot right hander with an ERA of 5.10. He’s only got 47 strikeouts in 77.2 innings. He’s also given up 14 home runs in 14 starts.

The Rhode Island team ERA is 6.21. That’s 160th in the country. Walks are a huge problem. The Rams are 227th in that metric. All totaled up, they allow 6.7 runs per game which is 156th.

Rhode Island pitched it well in the Atlantic 10 Tournament. They only allowed six runs in three games. But that has been the outlier.

They’ve allowed nine-plus runs a whopping 20 times this year. Assuming Rhode Island doesn’t sweep through the regional, having to pitch three or four games without Levesque seems like a tall order for the Rams.

PLAYERS TO WATCH

Anthony DePino: .359 avg, 1.243 OPS, 19 HR, 60 RBI, 21-25 SB

Jack Hopko: .345 avg, 1.051 OPS, 15 HR, 80 RBI

Reece Moroney: .363 avg, 24 SB

Trystan Levesque: 8-1, 3.25 ERA, 88.2 IP, 83 K, 32 ER, 23 BB, 90 K, opp BA- .246