BOSTON -- The Northeastern University baseball team (23-16, 13-5 CAA) returns home to Friedman Diamond this weekend for a three-game CAA series against Hofstra (14-20, 8-10 CAA), with games scheduled for Friday at 2 p.m., Saturday at 1 p.m., and Sunday at 1 p.m. with Saturday's contest serving as Senior Day and Alumni Day. All three contests will stream on FloCollege - Friday's game can also be seen on NESN+. The Huskies are looking to bounce back to avenge their only CAA series loss of the season so far, which took place in Hempstead last month against the Pride.
THREE THINGS TO KNOW:
1. HIGHWAY ROBBERY: The Northeastern baserunning express has been one of the best stories in college baseball this spring — and with a critical home series on the horizon, the Huskies are still in the thick of a race for the national stolen base crown. Northeastern enters the weekend with 154 stolen bases, trailing only VMI's 157 for the national lead. The Keydets have been a perennial juggernaut on the basepaths — they've claimed the NCAA Division I stolen base title three straight seasons — and the gap between the two programs heading into the final stretch of the regular season is just three bags. Northeastern has had multiple big steal days fueling their total, including an 11-bag game at Brown in March and continued aggression in Greensboro last weekend with14 steals in the series, including seven in game two. Leading the charge individually is Harrison Feinberg, who sits fourth in the country with 31 stolen bases on the season — joining a Huskies team that leads the CAA in steals by a wide margin and has been one of the most disruptive offensive units in the country on the bases.
2. SCOUTING THE PRIDE: Hofstra comes to Boston riding momentum after a dramatic series win at UNCW this past weekend — the Pride's most impressive result of the season. In the series opener on Friday, starter Carlos Martinez struck out a career-high 15 batters in a 10-1 Hofstra rout at Brooks Field. After getting run-ruled 12-0 on Saturday, the Pride rallied in the rubber game Sunday to pull off a 6-5 comeback win, scoring three two-out runs in the ninth inning — capped by CJ Griggs' go-ahead two-run homer off the light stanchion in left-center — and then holding off a UNCW threat in the bottom of the frame to steal the series. That win over the second-place Seahawks was Hofstra's signature result of a season that also included series losses to Stony Brook and Towson in the weeks following their win over Northeastern.
3. LAST TIME OUT: Northeastern took care of business in Greensboro, sweeping North Carolina A&T in three games at World War Memorial Stadium to improve to 13-5 in CAA play. The Huskies were dominant from the jump — in Friday's opener, Robbie O'Connor delivered five scoreless innings and AJ Aschettino drove in five runs on a first-inning two-run double and a seventh-inning three-run home run in a 15-0 mercy-rule shutout. Northeastern scored double digits in each of the first two games before closing out the sweep Sunday, 15-5, as Ryan Griffin earned his sixth win and the offense totaled 42 runs and 40 hits over the three-game set, with seven home runs from six different players. CAA Rookie of the Week Tyler Harmony had two of those homers, the first two of his career, notching multi-hit days in every game of the series. The sweep pushed Northeastern into the division lead heading into a pivotal homestand with three games in hand over second-place Monmouth.
