“The baseball gods were against us,” baseball head coach Neil McPhee said, looking back on a weekend when the Huskies were swept by Virginia Commonwealth in the opening weekend of conference play.

McPhee and his club lost both games of Saturday’s double-header in Richmond, Va., after the rain washed out Friday night’s contest. The Huskies dropped the first game 6-5 after a walk-off single in the bottom of the ninth sealed off a four-run comeback for the Rams.

The results of game two mirrored game one as the Rams edged out the Huskies 5-4, delivering the final blow in the bottom of the ninth. The weekend concluded with a 9-4 loss for the Huskies, however, their performance was stronger than was reflected in the box score, McPhee said.

“It was one of those weekends where we actually played a whole lot better than it would indicate [by] losing all three games,” McPhee said. “Especially Saturday, the pitching was good to very good, the hitting was good to very good, and the defense was lacking certainly in some regards. We played well enough to win both games on Saturday, and losing in the bottom of the ninth is just not a fun way to spend your afternoon at baseball.”

The loss in game two of the double-header was perhaps the toughest to swallow, as the Huskies entered the bottom of the ninth with a 4-2 lead. With Rams catcher Taylor Perkins on first base and one out, VCU centerfielder M.L. Milton dropped a bunt down the first base side. As Husky sophomore pitcher Andrew Leenhouts went to field the ball, he collided with Milton, but stayed in the game.

An untimely passed ball in the next at-bat advanced the runners to second and third and a wild pitch scored Perkins following that. In an attempt to throw out Perkins at the plate, NU freshman catcher Jon Leroux threw the ball away, scoring Milton as well. With the game knotted at four, Leenhouts walked second baseman Richard Gonzalez and was relieved by senior closer Dan Zehr. VCU answered with a pair of singles that scored Gonzalez for the walk-off win.

In game one, the Huskies jumped out to a four run lead, but VCU scored four of their own off Husky senior hurler Les Williams in the bottom of the fourth. The teams traded runs and entered the bottom of the ninth tied at five, only to have VCU’s Joe Van Meter poke a single to right field off senior reliever Charly Bashara to score the winning run.

The Rams jumped out to a 5-1 lead Sunday and didn’t look back, outhitting the Huskies 15 to 8, and winning by a score of 9-4. Despite the three-game sweep, McPhee emphasized the strong points of the weekend.

“We talked to them about the good parts of the game we still displayed when losing the weekend,” McPhee said. “The pitching of Les [Williams] wasn’t as superb as the week before, but through four innings they only had one hit off of him. But they got a lot of groundballs through the hole type hits. Those balls hit at somebody can turn into inning ending double plays that can do a lot of things like save runs. He threw a lot of strikes, and that’s the name of the game. Leenhouts was dominant in his game, Charly Bashara pitched exactly the way he’s been pitching, and Danny Zehr came out of the bullpen and gave up three ground balls and that’s what he’s supposed to do, and yet that ended up being the winning run.”

An out-of-conference contest against local rival Boston College yesterday proved no better for Northeastern, as the Eagles squeaked out a 5-4 victory at Friedman Diamond. The game was originally scheduled for Tuesday but was postponed due to rain.

After this weekend, the Huskies are amidst a six-game losing streak, but McPhee said with a strong offense and hard work, things can be turned around.

“One through six is .319-.407, which is a phenomenal middle of the lineup,” McPhee said. “We’re hitting almost .300 as a team, we’ve cut down on our strikeouts, and surpassed the goals offensively we thought we’d have to do. All the signs point to a very promising year, yet we’re 0-3 in the conference. We need to work past it and understand we have most parts of the game to not just compete, but get back in that tournament.”

The Huskies resume conference play this weekend when they host Hofstra at Friedman Diamond. For McPhee and company, things do not look so gray even after standing 0-3 in conference play.

“We’re in a very good frame of mind right now,” McPhee said. “Naturally nobody likes to come off of an 0-3 weekend, but that’s what athletes are supposed to be all about, they move forward.”