Dartmouth Professional Athletes

When the Yankees needed someone to fill Aaron Judge's shoes in the Wild Card opener, two Dartmouth men answered the call — and proceeded to make franchise history together.

Rice Joins Berra and Gehrig

Ben Rice's Game 1 performance against the Red Sox on September 30 wasn't just good. It was historically good. The Dartmouth first baseman went 4-for-5 with two home runs, six RBIs, and a double in New York's 9-0 rout — one of the best individual postseason performances in Yankees franchise history. The stat line put him in elite company: Rice tied a Yankees all-time record previously held by Yogi Berra and Lou Gehrig, cementing himself alongside two of the sport's immortal names in a single October night.

The exclamation point came in the eighth inning, when Rice launched a grand slam off Brayan Bello to push the lead to 9-0. The sellout Yankee Stadium crowd of 48,437 had been loud all night; that blow silenced any remaining suspense. Rice, who grew up in Cohasset, Mass. and wore a Yankees jersey to his first-grade picture day, had spent a lifetime waiting to torture Boston in the Bronx.

He wasn't done. Rice followed up Game 1 by going 1-for-3 with a run scored and a walk in Game 2 on October 1 (another Yankees victory, 9-2), then drew a walk in the ALDS opener against Tampa Bay on October 3 while carrying a .417 average through the first round. His postseason slash line through the Wild Card Series stood at a staggering .800 average by series' end — the kind of number that makes playoff legend status feel less like hype and more like fact.

Schlittler Shuts the Door

Rice had plenty of help from a fellow Dartmouth alum on the mound. Cam Schlittler, the Yankees' right-hander, turned in a 6⅓-inning shutout performance in Game 1 — throwing 117 pitches and keeping Boston scoreless throughout his outing. Schlittler and Rice together made MLB history with their combined statistical output in the blowout, a postgame note that drew praise from Yankees legend CC Sabathia, who made a pointed statement about Schlittler's dominant effort.

The 9-0 final was the kind of Wild Card Game 1 performance that leaves a series feeling over before it begins. With Judge sidelined by a calf strain, the Yankees leaned on their Dartmouth pipeline — and it delivered one of the more remarkable two-man performances in recent playoff memory.

Ivy League, October Pedigree

Rice's path to postseason stardom has drawn national attention this week, with outlets noting the rarity of Ivy League players reaching the majors at all, let alone performing at this level on baseball's biggest stage. As a Dartmouth product bucking decades of conventional baseball recruiting wisdom, Rice's October surge carries a broader storyline: the Ivy League can produce playoff stars.

For Big Green alumni watching from Hanover or anywhere else, this is the week to be loud about it.

The Dartmouth Kid Taking Over New York

Ben Rice doesn't look like a breakout story anymore. He looks like a cornerstone.

The 27-year-old Dartmouth alum and Yankees first baseman turned in one of his best weeks of the season during the Sept. 13–19 stretch, homering in two separate series — including his 38th of the year in the Subway Series finale against the Mets — and drawing consistent praise from the biggest names in the Yankees' clubhouse. For a player that scouts and prospect evaluators largely overlooked coming up, the moment feels richly earned.

Subway Series Hero

Rice led off the Yankees' Sunday matchup against the Mets on Sept. 13 — an unusual lineup call that spoke to the trust manager Aaron Boone has placed in him — and delivered exactly what was asked. He went 1-for-1 with a home run, two walks, and the lone RBI in a 2-0 Yankees win that clinched two of three in the Bronx. That 38th home run was, per Yahoo Sports, all New York needed.

After the game, Aaron Judge offered a bold endorsement of his teammate, and Cody Bellinger followed suit with a statement of his own. When two of the game's premier position players are publicly vouching for a first-year standout with postseason stakes rising, that's not locker room noise — that's signal.

Carrying the Load

The Subway Series performance wasn't a flash. During the week that followed, Rice continued to produce: he went 2-for-4 with a home run, two RBIs, two runs scored, and two walks in Saturday's 9-2 rout of the Arizona Diamondbacks, raising his season average to .264. Gerrit Cole, who started and dominated in that game, was asked about Rice afterward and added his own glowing assessment via the YES Network. When your ace is volunteering post-win quotes about a position player's performance, something real is happening.

Rice also had multi-walk games against the Twins earlier in the week — drawing three free passes on Wednesday alone — a sign that opposing pitchers are beginning to respect, and sometimes avoid, him in the zone.

The Prospect Miss

Adding an intriguing layer to Rice's rise: Keith Law, one of baseball's most respected prospect analysts, published a piece this week explaining why he got Rice wrong as a prospect. Law acknowledged he never viewed Rice as a high-ranking talent — a miss he's now accounting for publicly. Rice has become, alongside Spencer Jones and Cam Schlittler, one of the Yankees' certified breakout stars of 2026, per Yahoo Sports.

The Bigger Picture

With Aaron Judge managing an injury and the Yankees navigating the final weeks of the regular season, Rice's emergence couldn't be better timed. He's no longer just filling in or flashing potential — he's leading off, slugging at a 38-homer pace, and earning the endorsement of a locker room that knows what October demands.

For Dartmouth alumni watching from Hanover, it's worth savoring. Players from the Ivy League don't often get to this stage. Rice isn't just here — he's thriving.

Big Green in the Bronx

Ben Rice is making Dartmouth proud — and making opposing pitchers miserable.

The Yankees first baseman slugged his 37th home run of the season Friday night in a 6-4 Subway Series win over the Mets, finishing with three hits, one RBI, and three runs scored to pace New York's offense. It was the kind of marquee performance that has defined Rice's breakout 2026 campaign: clutch, consistent, and increasingly impossible to ignore.

Rice's homer extended the Yankees' lead, but it wasn't his only contribution to the victory. Earlier in the game, Rice converted a successful ABS (automated ball-strike) challenge that ultimately set the table for Cody Bellinger's decisive three-run shot — a sequence that proved just as pivotal as any swing Rice himself took. New York has now won four games in a row, and Rice has been at the center of the surge.

The Dartmouth product is batting .259 on the season — a figure that undersells his impact in run-scoring situations. Sports Illustrated noted that Rice's offensive turnaround is coming "at the perfect time for the Bronx Bombers," with the Yankees pressing for playoff position in September. Bellinger himself weighed in on Rice's stretch of play after a separate win over the Padres, where Rice went 3-for-3 with two walks — further evidence that this isn't a hot week, it's a sustained run.

Manager Aaron Boone has also been publicly effusive. Ahead of the Padres series, Boone made pointed remarks about Rice's value to the lineup, according to Heavy Sports — a notable endorsement given that Rice has had to carve out his role alongside returning captain Aaron Judge. Rice, for his part, has been measured and complimentary of Judge publicly, even as his own star has risen.

Thirty-seven home runs with weeks remaining in the regular season puts Rice in rarefied air for any Dartmouth alumnus to have produced.

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Rest of the Big Green

Elsewhere in the majors, Cole Sulser continued working in relief for the Rays, logging three appearances during the period (Sept. 6, 8, and 9) and throwing one inning in each. His ERA sits at 4.74 after the stretch — serviceable middle-relief work for a Tampa Bay club managing its way through September. Kyle Hendricks had no recorded activity in the brief for the Angels during the period.

Rice remains, by a wide margin, the story of Dartmouth's 2026 MLB season. Whether he finishes with 40-plus home runs may depend on how the Yankees deploy him down the stretch — but the Big Green faithful have every reason to keep watching.