Notre Dame announced on April 27 that its baseball team will play Central Michigan on Tuesday and Milwaukee on Wednesday at Jake Kline Field at Frank Eck Stadium. The first game against Central Michigan is scheduled for 5:30 p.m., followed by the matchup with Milwaukee at 6:30 p.m. Both games will be broadcast on ACCNX.
The upcoming contests are part of Notre Dame’s regular season schedule, giving the team opportunities to build momentum ahead of further conference play. The Irish lead the all-time series against Central Michigan with a record of 24-14-1, and have a 10-3 advantage over Milwaukee.
Shawn Stiffler, John P. and Catherine Murphy Head Baseball Coach, recently became the seventh coach in program history to achieve more than 100 wins while leading Notre Dame. The current roster includes sixteen returners from last year’s squad that finished the regular season with a strong record of 16-2.
Several players have received recognition for their performances this season. Jack Radel retired thirty-eight consecutive batters over two games earlier this year and threw six perfect innings with nine strikeouts against UCF using only sixty-eight pitches. Caden Crowell was ranked ninth on D1Baseball’s Freshman Impact List for 2026, while six players were included in D1baseball.com’s preseason positional rankings: Bino Watters (first baseman), Jack Radel (starting pitcher), Mark Quatrani (catcher), Drew Berkland (outfielder), Oisin Lee (relief pitcher), and Davis Johnson (outfielder).
The Irish lineup features twelve true freshmen, including six who were among the top two recruits at their positions within their states’ Class of 2025 rankings. Seven transfer student-athletes joined Notre Dame for this season, five of whom are graduate students.
Notre Dame has posted notable offensive achievements during recent games as well, including collecting twelve two-out runs batted in during a series win at Duke and scoring ten runs before recording an out—powered by two grand slams—in a victory over Louisville.
