@NCBearsBaseball Travel Back to California To Take On Pacific

Friday, March 4

Stockton, Calif.

7:00 pm

University of Northern Colorado

Pacific

3/2/2016 3:37:00 PM | Baseball

UNC baseball returns to California for a four game series vs Pacific

By: Ryan Pfeifer, UNCBears.com

GREELEY, Colo. – The Northern Colorado baseball team will be making another weekend trip to California this week to take on Pacific. The Bears and Tigers will face off in a four game series that includes a double-header now on Friday, instead of Saturday due to weather. Also both Saturday's and Sunday's game time are now TBA because of the weather.

Series Notes: Northern Colorado | Pacific | WAC

Series Information

Game 1	RHP Connor Leedholm (0-2, 4.22 ERA) vs RHP Will Lydon (0-2, 4.15 ERA)	Gameday Central
Game 2	RHP Alex Werbach (0-0, 3.6 ERA) vs LHP Ricky Reynoso (1-0, 4.76 ERA)	Gameday Central
Game 3	TBD vs RHP Jake Jenkins (1-1, 3.00 ERA)	Gameday Central
Game 4	LHP Nick Tanner vs RHP Joe Ryan (0-2, 19.80 ERA)	Gameday Central

Leading Off
• The Bears are in the middle of a 15 game road trip to open the season. During the trip UNC will visit three different states and play against five different teams.
• Northern Colorado is coming off a 1-3 weekend at CSUN. The Bears dropped the first three games of the series, including a Saturday double-header. UNC would pick up a 3-2 win on get-away day.
• Nick Tanner has had a pair of good outings this season on the mound. He currenlty has a 0.00 ERA in 11 2/3 innings pitched. In his last outing agianst CSUN, he held the Matadors hitless through four innings.
• Brett Minnick showed off his power last weekend, hitting the team's first two home runs of the season in back-to-back games.
• Freshman Cory Nakukura earned his second win of the season on Sunday with a 3 1/3 innings outing, allowing just one hit and striking out four.
• The Bears have been doing a good job of working their way out of jams so far this season, having their opponents to strand 91 runners on base through nine games.
• Cole Maltese and Dan Reese were named to College Sports Madness Preseason All-WAC team. Maltese on the first team and Reese on the second.
• Northern Colorado was picked eighth by the WAC coaches in the Preseason Poll. The Bears are used to out playing their expectations after making it to Mesa, Arizona last season for the conference tournament after being picked last in the preseason.

Scouting Pacific
Pacific comes in with an identical record as UNC, coming off an 8-7 loss to San Jose State Tuesday night. The Tigers started the season on a five game losing streak, but picked up their first win last weekend.

The Tigers spilt a four game series with Northwestern last weekend, taking the middle two games against the Wildcats.

Eight of Pacific's nine starters are hitting above .200 for the year, including three above .300. Nate Verlin leads the team with a .359 average, scoring six times while driving in four as well.

On the mound, Pacific is struggling so far with a 7.12 team ERA. Only four of its 14 pitchers that have made an appearance this season have an ERA under 4.00. Opposing teams are also hitting .304 against the Tigers.

Series History vs the Tigers
This will be the first ever meeting between Northern Colorado and Pacific.

Turning Two
UNC has been doing a good job of getting two outs in one play this season. The Bears have turned seven double plays already for the year. Those seven double plays rank 50th overall in the NCAA and second in the WAC behind Utah Valley's eight.

Yamane The Man
After missing last year with a foot injury, Ryan Yamane has a few different UNC baseball records within reach. Coming into the 2016 season, he ranks seventh in at bats with 638, 14th in hits (185) and second in walks with 115. Yamane is just six walks away from tying the program record of 121 set by Jeff Cheek who played from 1972-75.

What Freshman Jitters?
Tyler Yamaguchi showed no freshman jitters during the first week of his colligate career. Coming out of the first week of play he is second the team with a .273 batting average. He has done well in the lead-off spot setting the table and scoring five times for UNC. In his second career game Yamaguchi had three hits, all of them being doubles.

He followed it up with another strong effort during the second weekend scoring another run and driving in a run in UNC's win on Sunday.

All Arms In
Playing five straight games can take a toll on any pitching staff, for UNC they were able to string together a staff in the final game at Kansas. The Bears used eight pitchers lasting no more than 1 2/3 of an inning, but did see positive results. The eight pitchers combined to allow just two runs and six hits in the game.

Moving Runners Over
Senior Jake Ek moved plenty of runners over last year, finishing the season ranked 18th in the nation with 15 sacrifice bunts. Those 15 bunts helped produce nine runs for the team last year.

Following the Bears
Want to stay up to date with all things UNC Bears Baseball? There are a few ways to. During all games this year there will be live updates on the team's Twitter account @NCBearsBaseball.

For home games there will also be a live audio broadcast of the games as well as live stats on UNCBears.com. Finally after all of the team's home games make sure to get on Facebook and look for the update on the live look at the postgame press conference.

Bear in the Big Leagues
For the first time since 2011, Northern Colorado had a player drafted in the MLB draft last June. Senior Jensen Park was selected by the Colorado Rockies in the 32nd round. Before Park was drafted last year, Jarod Berggren was the last UNC player drafted back in 2011.

Making the Grades
Northern Colorado baseball had seven players earn their spot on the WAC All-Academic team for 2015. Those players were Allen Cook, Caleb Kirkman, Cole Maltese, Dan Reese, Reyn Sugai, Zach Heath and Brett Minnick.

Home Grown
Head coach Carl Iwasaki and his staff have done a good job of keeping the home grown talent in the state. 12 of UNC's 32 hail from the Centennial State.

Hawaii Five-0
The Bears have a little Hawaii flair to them with three players plus head coach Carl Iwasaki and assistant Kaiona Correa all coming to Colorado from the islands.

Exceeding Expectations
For the second straight year, UNC is going to have to exceed the expectations of the WAC coaches to make another trip to Mesa, Arizona for the conference tournament. The WAC coaches pegged the Bears to finish eighth in the conference. Last year the team was picked to finish last in the preseason, but exceed those expectations finishing 7th to make it to Mesa.

New Faces
Northern Colorado not only welcomes 11 new players to this year's ball club, but also has some new faces on the coaching staff. Kai Correa moves up to a full-time assistant after being a volunteer last season, while Coach Iwa also brought on Jordan Stouffer and Dan Siegfried as a volunteer assistant and director of baseball operations.

Class of 2017
While the 2016 season is just about to kick-off, UNC has already secured eight new players for its 2017 team. During the early signing period this year the Bears have brought in three infielders, a catchers, two utility players and a pair of right handed pitchers.

On Deck
UNC closes out its road trip at Nebraska for a pair of mid-week games over March 8 and 9.

In the Hole
The Bears will finally host their home opener, next weekend. They will welcome old NCC and Great West Rival South Dakota State to Jackson Field for three games.