TROY, N.Y. - Led by 30th-year head coach Karl Steffen, the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) baseball team will be the top seed and host of the 2015 Liberty League Tournament, which begins on Thursday at Robison Field. The Engineers, who are 22-14 overall, went 18-6 in conference play to win the regular season title. They host fourth seed Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) in the second game on day one (3:30pm). Second seed Clarkson University hosts third seed University of Rochester to open play (12pm).

Senior second baseman Tim LeSuer (Oak View, CA/Nordoff) is batting a team-best .395 (49 for 124) with nine doubles, a triple, 40 runs scored and 28 runs batted in. He has a .484 on-base percentage and a .513 on-base percentage, while going 12 for 14 on stolen base attempts. Classmate and captain Jared Jensen (Kingston, NY/Kingston) is second at .377 (49 for 130) with eight doubles, four triples, seven home runs, 46 runs and 31 RBI. He has a .662 slugging percentage, with nine steals in 12 tries. Fellow senior and shortstop Nick Palmiero (Patterson, NY/Carmel) rounds out the top three hitters at .358 (44 for 123) with 14 doubles, three triples, one homer, 31 runs and 33 RBI. He has compiled a .545 slugging percentage and a .470 on-base percentage.

On the hill, senior righthander Sean Conroy (Clifton Park, NY/Shenendehowa) is 5-1 with a 1.55 earned run average in 10 appearances (all starts). He has allowed 16 runs (11 earned) on 47 hits in 63.2 innings, with 69 strikeouts and 18 while. Opponents hit just .205 off of him. Junior Greg Echeverria (Longmeadow, MA/Longmeadow) is 5-3 with a 1.78 ERA in nine appearances (8 starts). He has given up 23 runs (12 earned) on 56 hits in 60.2 innings, striking out 55, while walking only nine. Allowing a .231 opponent average, he is 5-1 with a 0.90 ERA in six conference starts.

RPI last qualified for the Liberty League Tournament in 2013, which was hosted by Union College at Siena College. The Engineers defeated the top-seeded Dutchmen to earn the automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament. Rensselaer has hosted the tournament five times (the most of any school) since 2003, winning just once (in 2003). Since then, only two host schools have ever won the tournament title (Skidmore '05 and Union '14). 

The full tournament schedule, results and live coverage for every game can be found at www.rpiathletics.com/LLBT15. There will be live stats and every contest will be broadcast live on 91.5 FM, WRPI. For those outside the Capital Region, the audio stream can be heard online at www.wrpi.org/listen.