By Jenna Majeski, news staff
The Northeastern baseball team lost its first three-game series against Auburn University in Auburn, Alabama, this weekend with a final score of 1-2.
The weekend was off to a rough start with a no-hitter on Friday, finishing the game 6-0. A key factor in the loss was Auburn’s star pitcher Casey Mize, who pitched all nine innings.
“[Mize] is probably going to be the best pitcher we see all year,” head coach Mike Glavine said. “He’s potentially a top pick in the draft. He may go No. 1 overall. He was awesome, and that’s probably the best performance I’ve seen in 11 years of college baseball. ”
Mize struck out 13 players in Friday’s game, but the Huskies refused to let the loss negatively impact them.
“We’ve had some tough losses this year and what you see is that it doesn’t affect us and that is such a great quality to have in a team,” Glavine said.
Fourth-year captain Max Burt agreed with this sentiment as he described the determined and unaffected mindset of the team.
“We knew Auburn was a good team coming into this weekend and we knew we had our work cut out for us,” Burt said. “We weren’t going to let a tough loss Friday night affect the rest of the weekend.”
In Saturday’s first game, the Huskies again fell to Auburn 14-8.
Northeastern started the day slowly, trailing the Tigers by seven at the end of the third inning. The Huskies scored one run in the fourth inning that remained the team’s singular point until the ninth inning, during which they picked up seven more runs.
Northeastern showed an impressive performance in the ninth inning, as Ian Fair and Cam Walsh both batted runners in, and Michael Geaslen hit a home-run securing three more runs for the Huskies. Still, they were unable to catch up to Auburn’s lead.
“In game two I was a little disappointed in how we played, how we came out in the early innings, and even late in the game how we let it slip away,” Glavine said.
The Huskies quickly turned around in Saturday’s second game with a 2-1 win, featuring a noteworthy performance by CAA pitcher of the week Sean Mellen, a second-year player who pitched almost eight full innings with no hits.
“I think the first thing that motivated us was Sean Mellen,” Glavine said. “He just comes out and pitches another great game. He gives the team a ton of confidence. He went out and we got a zero in the first inning, and I think it allowed us to settle into the game finally and play our style of baseball.”
Burt was another standout player, as he stepped up in his defensive role to prevent a tying run in the eighth inning.
“We got a couple timely runs early and then of course the defense was just at another level in that game,” Glavine said. “We had some great plays the entire game, but obviously in particular the play by Max Burt and [John] Mazza in the eighth inning to keep it a 2-1 game.”
This win ended Auburn’s undefeated season and showed the Huskies can handle a highly-ranked team.
“This team is showing that they can play under pressure, showing it can play against nationally ranked teams and teams in the SEC [Southeastern Conference],” Glavine said. “Overall, I think we got better this weekend. We beat a team that was undefeated and nationally ranked.”
This weekend, the Huskies will hold their home opener against the College of the Holy Cross at the Friedman Diamond in Brookline, Massachusetts.
“I think we need this — we need to come back home,” Burt said. “We’ve been on the road for those first 14 games, so I think that it’s going to be a nice change for us, coming home and playing in front of our home crowd.”
