The New Orleans Privateers baseball team will return home for the first time in over two weeks as they begin a three-game series against the McNeese Cowboys on Thursday, Apr. 1, at Maestri Field. The opening game is set for a 6:30 p.m. start.
This homecoming follows a lengthy 10-game road trip that ended with a close 2-1 victory over South Alabama in Mobile. The win marked the Privateers’ fifth consecutive triumph over South Alabama, which is their longest streak against the Jaguars since an eight-game run from 1992 to 1995. The one run allowed by New Orleans was also their lowest given up to South Alabama in their last 48 meetings dating back to 2004.
Relief pitcher Lane Alack has moved into a tie for the conference lead in saves after recording his third save of the season during Tuesday’s win. Alack averages just over two innings per appearance and leads the team’s pitching staff with nearly 62 percent of his pitches thrown for strikes.
Defensively, New Orleans has improved recently, playing four error-free games and committing only five errors across their last seven contests. This contrasts with an earlier seven-game stretch from March 11-20 when they committed thirteen errors and had just one errorless game.
Offensively, Kruise Newman has recorded four multi-hit games in his last six starts and leads the team with eight home runs and twenty-eight runs batted in heading into this weekend’s matchup. He has driven in nine runs during this recent span.
The upcoming series presents an opportunity for New Orleans to reverse recent trends; since joining the Southland Conference, McNeese has won twenty-seven out of thirty-six meetings between these teams and holds a forty-two to thirty advantage overall.
McNeese enters this weekend at .500 (6-6) in conference play and stands at fifteen wins and fourteen losses overall after defeating Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns by a score of ten to seven. The Cowboys have tallied double-digit hits in five of their last eight games leading up to this series. Matt Stancliff currently leads the Southland Conference with seventeen stolen bases without being caught once this season, while McNeese pitchers have accumulated three hundred strikeouts—second most among conference teams.
