Pitching coach Buck Kicinski had a mission for his Penn State baseball club pitchers going into this weekend.

He wanted a minimum of walks, a minimum of mistakes. What he wanted was near perfection. Carmon Comunale, Chris Rayburg and Bill Lippert tossed back-to-back-to-back five-inning no-hitters in a tripleheader sweep of Lafayette on Saturday. The Nittany Lions (14-3, 9-0 New Penn) defeated the Leopards (0-7, 0-7) via the 10-run mercy rule, 13-0, 14-0, 22-0. The mercy rule shortens the usually seven-inning games to five innings.

Comunale started the day off with the first no-no. He struck out two while allowing just two base runners, both reaching on errors. Rayburg followed that with possibly the most impressive pitching outing of the day.

Rayburg allowed just one base runner. With a one ball, two strike count on the No. 9 hitter in Lafayette's lineup, Rayburg threw a pitch that appeared to catch the corner of the strike zone, but it was ruled a ball. The batter drew a walk two pitches later.

In his five innings of work, Rayburg struck out 11 while not allowing a ball out of the infield all game. Lippert closed out the day with a five-strikeout performance. He walked two batters, while two more reached base on errors bringing Lafayette's total number of men-on-base for the day to seven.

"I'm pretty sure I lead the country in run support," Lippert said. In his last two starts Penn State has scored 28 and 22 runs, respectively.

Run support for any pitcher has not been a problem for the Lions this season, and that trend continued against the Leopards. The team's 49 runs were the result of a .566 (43-for-76) team batting average. Doubles and walks were the weapons with which the offense bombarded the opposition. Penn State rapped out 16 doubles and took advantage of 25 free passes from Lafayette pitchers. John Ruhf (seven hits, 10 RBI), Jason Bunda (seven hits, eight RBI) and Scott Shirley (six hits, six RBI and one home run) led the charge for the Lions.

"Runs are awesome," Penn State baseball club head coach Dan Day said. "No matter [what happens with the pitching] we will need runs. We've kept producing runs, unlike in the past. This year we keep going."

The high amount of runs resulted in long spans of non-activity for the Penn State pitchers. Even so, the pitchers and coaches were pleased with the way the pitchers were able to stay focused.

"It's tough when [the other teams] aren't showing up," Lippert said. "But pitching is pitching, you just take every batter [one at a time]."