Snow may have given the Washington State Cougars a break, but that break will not last long, as the baseball team travels to California once again to play a four-game series against Cal State Northridge (4-4) beginning Thursday.

Poor weather conditions are expected in Northridge as well, so the teams will play a doubleheader to start the series. The rest of the games will remain scheduled to allow for flexibility, but the teams will only play a maximum of four games this weekend. 

The Cougars (1-5) will play a Northridge team that has only had one big loss all season at the hands of UCLA, which is a team that the NCBWA ranked as high as No. 13 in the nation. The Matadors lost to UCLA 7-1, and have not lost by more than two runs in any of their other matchups. 

The Cougars have shown their pitching staff’s vulnerability already, and will look to improve on the mound in this series. Meanwhile, the WSU lineup has struggled to capitalize in key situations  this season, which has created multiple areas for improvement. 

“Starting pitching needs to be better. Offensively we need to be more consistent, and defensively we have some lulls,” Head Coach Donnie Marbut said in his Tuesday press conference. “There’s nothing that we can’t do better, and there’s nothing that we won’t do better. Hopefully that starts on Thursday.” 

Scott Simon has only six total innings pitched in two outings this season, and an ERA of 13.50. Tanner Chleborad pitched nine innings in two starts, but owns a bloated ERA of 6.00. 

Ian Hamilton is the only pitcher on the entire staff to not surrender a run yet, earned or unearned. 

Of the three main starting pitchers for Cal State Northridge, Brycen Rutherford has performed the best overall, going 1-0 in two starts with a 1.98 ERA. Every Northridge starter has averaged at least six innings in their appearances this season. 

“If you look at their numbers, they pitch the ball really well and they don’t make any errors,” Marbut said. “Those are two really good places to start.”

Marbut’s Cougars have committed eight errors while the Matadors have only three, and have played more games. 

Other than Hamilton in the bullpen, third baseman Nick Tanielu has been a bright spot for the Cougar offense. Tanielu is batting .435 with 10 hits and four RBIs, and has yet to make an error at the hot corner. 

 “Hopefully he can stay healthy and just keep doing his thing and hopefully the guys around him can get on base a little bit more, so he’s got the opportunity to drive some more runs in and score some more runs for us,” Marbut said of Tanielu. 

WSU is 14-9 all-time against the Matadors, and is 9-5 when the teams play in Northridge. 

Joe Pistorese, who is coming off of a five-inning relief stint in which he allowed one run and struck out six, has earned the right to start Game one of the series on Thursday. He will face Jerry Keel, who has two tough-luck losses this season. In the games that Keel has pitched, he has given up five total runs and the Matadors have only scored three total runs in support of him. 

Jason Monda, Chleborad and Simon are all expected to pitch in the series. The first game is set to begin at 10:30 a.m. today.