Baseball Wraps Up California Road Trip at No. 2 / No. 1 UCLA On Tuesday

Tuesday, February 17

Los Angeles, CA

3 p.m.

Tulane University

UCLA

Baseball Wraps Up California Road Trip at No. 2 / No. 1 UCLA On Tuesday

Feb 16, 2026 | Baseball

TUESDAY: WATCH | LISTEN | LIVE STATS

TULANE GAME NOTES

NEW ORLEANS – The Tulane baseball team finishes up the California road trip across town against No. 2 / No. 1 UCLA on Tuesday, Feb. 17, at 3 p.m. CT at Jackie Robinson Stadium.

Media
The contest against UCLA will be shown on the Big Ten Network +. The Voice of the Green Wave, Corey Gloor, will return to call the action on the Tulane Sports Network from Learfield on WRBH 88.3/Varsity Network. Airtime for radio for the game is 15 minutes before first pitch at 2:45 p.m. CT

Pitching Matchup
The Green Wave will start senior J.D. Rodriguez. Rodriguez pitched 4.2 scoreless innings in relief on Friday, Feb. 13, with a career-high nine strikeouts against Loyola Marymount. Last season, he appeared in 14 games with eight starts. He went 2-2 with a 6.54 ERA in 26.1 innings thrown.

UCLA is planning on starting freshman right-handed pitcher Angel Cervantes. Cervantes is a Lynwood, California native. He was rated as the No. 2 right-handed pitcher by Prep Baseball and the No. 5 prospect overall in the state of California. He pitched in one game in the opening series and allowed two hits and two walks plus a run in an inning of work

Scouting UCLA
The Bruins are one of the premier programs in college baseball and come into the week ranked at No. 2 nationally in the USA Today Coaches' Poll and No. 1 in the poll by D1 Baseball. UCLA was also unanimously chosen to repeat as the champions in the Big Ten Conference by their league's coaches.

UCLA took two of the first three games to start the season against UC San Diego. Payton Brennan led the charge against the Tritons with four hits, a home run and five RBIs. Roch Cholowsky already has three extra bases hit (two doubles and a home run) in his first three games.

The program went 48-18 last season including a run to the College World Series. Cholowsky, the reigning Big 10 Player of the Year and Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year, hit .353 with 80 runs, 89 hits, 23 home runs, 74 RBIs, 179 total bases and a .710 slugging percentage. Mullivai Levu had a .320 batting average with 61 runs, 87 hits, 12 home runs and 85 RBIs in 2025. The Bruins welcome back two of the squad's top pitchers from a season ago in Michael Barnett and Ian May. Barnett had a 12-1 record with 75 strikeouts in 86 innings worked. May had an 8-3 record in 70.2 innings worked.

Head Coach John Savage is in his 22nd year in charge of the program. He is 726-482-2 with four College World Series appearances during his time with the Bruins.

Series History
UCLA leads Tulane 6-2 since the start of the series in 1974...The last time the two teams met was during the 2023 campaign with the Bruins earning a 10-3 victory (3/3/23).

Against the Big 10 Conference
The Green Wave are 69-53 all-time against current schools in the Big 10 Conference. Tulane has been playing Big 10 member institutions since 1915 when the program took on Illinois. The last time that Tulane faced off with a current Big 10 Conference school was in 2024 when the program took two of three against Northwestern to start the season (2/16-18/24).

Coming In On A Streak
Jason Wachs, despite seeing his hitting streak snapped at 23 games following the opening game of the season against LMU, has still now reached base safely in 29 consecutive games dating back to the end of last season.

Who's Hot in the First Three
Kaikea Harrison has started the season with seven hits in his first 15 at bats for a .467 batting average. He has a pair of three-hit performances to his name in two games after having two such games all of last season in 56 games. Harrison also has scored four runs and totaled a pair of doubles.

A.J. Groeneveld has begun his Tulane career with four hits including both a double and triple. He is also tied for second on the team in RBIs with three along with Matthias Haas, Tye Wood and Tanner Chun.

Jason Wachs leads the club in RBIs with four.

J.D. Rodriguez and Beau Sampson are tied for the team lead with nine strikeouts.

Every out that Jack Brafa recorded in his two innings of relief against LMU was a strikeout.

Trends
Dating back to the end of last season, two of last three hits that James Agabedis III has are home runs.

Tulane's game against No. 2 ranked (Coaches)/No. 1 (D1 Baseball) UCLA is the first time that the program has faced a ranked opponent since squaring off with No. 13 Southern Miss last season...The last time that Tulane faced a top 10 ranked opponent was against then No. 6 Oregon State in the Corvallis Regional (5/31/24)...The last time Tulane defeated a top 10 opponent was earlier that season when the program swept then No. 6 ECU at home by scores of 6-5, 7-3 and 10-9 (5/10-12/24).

Notables from the LMU Series
Tulane hit .275 as a team in the three-game set with 30 hits including 15 extra base hits.

The team's pitching staff recorded 44 strikeouts in 26 innings worked. The team's three starting pitchers in the series: Trey Cehajic, Beau Sampson, and Jack Frankel combined to throw 11.2 innings with 19 strikeouts. Both of the team's victories were earned by members of the bullpen in J.D. Rodriguez and Jack Brafa. Jude Abbadessa appeared in two of the three games of the series with both of his appearances coming in the ninth inning...He threw 1.2 scoreless with two strikeouts. The Green Wave bullpen only allowed a total of two earned run in 14.1 innings of use in the opening series while also registering 25 strikeouts. The Tulane pitching staff registered double digit strikeouts in every game of the series (14 - Gm 1, 11 - Gm 2 and 19 in Gm 3).

The Green Wave's 19 strikeouts as a pitching staff in the series finale against LMU was the most for the program in 54 years and tied for third all-time at the school with the 2023 team's 19 strikeouts against Penn. The team last struck out more than 19 when 21 strikeouts were recorded against Cornell of Iowa in 1972. The 1965 team struck out 20 against Ole Miss.

Of the team's top pitching strikeout totals in school history, six have been achieved since the start of the 2023 season (19 at LMU - 2/15/26, 19 vs. Pennsylvania - 3/10/23, 17 vs. Rice - 4/5/25, 16 at Southeastern Louisiana - 2/19/25, 16 at Southeastern Louisiana - 3/12/25, and 16 vs. Northwestern - 2/16/24)

Thirteen different players made their Tulane debut in the series.

Green Wave Chosen For Fourth and Has Two Named Preseason All-Conference
In a vote of the league's coaches, Tulane was picked for fourth and had two players selected as American Preseason All-Conference. The Green Wave were chosen for fourth overall with 57 points. The team also saw outfielder Jason Wachs and designated hitter Matthias Haas chosen as Preseason American All-Conference.

The 2026 Schedule
The Green Wave will host 27 games at Greer Field at Turchin Stadium, along with one neutral-site game in Mississippi and 28 road contests in 2026. Tulane will compete across seven states, including matchups in California, Alabama, Texas, Mississippi, Kansas, Florida, and North Carolina. Notable opponents include seven teams that participated in the 2025 NCAA Tournament: Southern Miss (2 games), UTSA (3), Creighton (3), East Carolina (3), TCU (3), Mississippi State (1), UCLA (1), and LSU (1).

The 2026 Schedule - Part Two
Tulane is playing games against five teams this season that are ranked in the USA Today's Preseason Coaches' Poll in No. 1 LSU, No. 2 UCLA, No. 6 Mississippi State, No. 10 TCU, and No. 20 Southern Miss.

Uncommon Road Start
Tulane's start on the road this season is the first for the program since 2023 and only the 11th time since 1979 the program has not started the season with games in New Orleans (1979, 1980, 1982, 1993, 2002, 2006, 2013, 2015, 2023, and 2026)

A Brotherly Connection
Tulane has a pair of brothers on the 2026 roster in sophomore infielder Nate Johnson and graduate student infielder Jake Johnson. The two are Tulane's first set of brothers on a team since 2017 when twins Paul Gozzo, a catcher, and Sal Gozzo, an infielder, were playing for the Green Wave. The 2016 team also had brothers on the squad in Ross Massey, a left-handed pitcher, and Alex Massey, a right-handed pitcher.

Who is Back?
The Green Wave return 14 players from the 2025 squad that a made a run to the 2025 American Championship Game for the third straight season this season in James Agabedis (infielder), Kaikea Harrison (infielder), Matthias Haas (infielder/outfielder), Tanner Chun (outfielder), Julius Ejike-Charles (left-handed pitcher/outfielder), Jason Wachs (outfielder), Hugh Pinkney (catcher), J.D. Rodriguez (right-handed pitcher), Nate Johnson (infielder), Will Clements (right-handed pitcher), Michael Devenney (right-handed pitcher), Jacob Moore (right-handed pitcher), Blaise Wilcenski (right handed pitcher), and Trey Cehajic (right-handed pitcher)

Inside the Numbers of the Returners
The team's 14 returning players accounted for 52.7 percent of the runs (204/387), 53 percent of the hits (287/541), 55 percent of the doubles (72/131), 58 percent of the triples (7/12), 45 percent of the home runs (23/51), 49 percent of the RBIs (178/360), 52 percent of the total bases (442/849) and 55 percent of the walks (159/287). On the mound, the club returns 48.4 percent of the wins (16/33), 53 percent of the game started (31/58), 43 percent of the innings (212/532) and 34 percent of the strikeouts (308/547).

Newcomers
Tulane added 23 new players to the roster this year. The list includes seven graduate students (Tye Wood, Brett Rowell, Trent Liolios, Jack Johnson, Jake Toporek, Tom Vincent and Aidan Rath), a senior (Nolan Nawrocki), seven juniors (Jude Abbadessa, Sam Larson, Caden Tarango, Jack Brafa, Beau Sampson, Owen Geiss, and Max Maxinter), four sophomores (AJ Groeneveld, Jack Frankel, Johnny Elliott, and LuisPablo Navarro) and four true freshmen (Bryson Ayala, Cole Berge, Evan Burg and Matthew Major).

The 2025 Season Quick Hitters
Tulane went 33-25 last season and had five American All-Conference selections on the year in Michael Lombardi (P – 1st), Connor Rasmussen (2B – 1st), Gavin Schulz (DH – 2nd), Jason Wachs (All-Freshman) and Tanner Chun (All-Freshman). The five selections are tied with the 2024 team for the most for the program since 2016 (seven).

The team also had three chosen for the league's All-Tournament Team in Schulz, Tayler Montiel and Theo Bryant IV plus a pair on the Louisiana Sports Writers Association (LSWA) All-State Team in Lombardi and Rasmussen.

Additionally, the program had three players selected in the 2025 MLB Draft in Lombardi (Kansas City Royals – 2nd round), Montiel (Arizona Diamondbacks – 12th round), and Rasmussen (Kansas City Royals – 15th round).

2025 Fun Stat Facts
Jason Wachs was ninth in the conference in batting average (.335) and on-base percentage (.457). Wachs and Tanner Chun were tied for 10th in the league in triples (2). Matthias Haas ranked second in the conference in doubles (21) and 26th in batting average (.303). Kaikea Harrison was tied for the conference lead in sacrifice bunts (8) and 38th in batting average (.283). Trey Cehajic and Blaise Wilcenski were tied for 10th in the league in wins (5).

Up Next
Next, Tulane returns home to Greer Field at Turchin Stadium to take on Harvard from Feb. 20-22. The series starts with a 6:30 p.m. contest against the Crimson on Friday night. A 1 p.m. contest follows on Saturday before the series concludes at noon on Sunday.

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