PISCATAWAY, N.J. – For the ninth time in 10 years, Rutgers baseball will open its season with a weekend series against a ranked Miami team. The three-game set will begin Friday at Alex Rodriguez Park and each contest will be broadcast by ACC Network Extra, which is available through WatchESPN.
The Scarlet Knights return 21 letterwinners from last season and welcome 13 newcomers. The roster includes 30 players from New Jersey, three from New York and one each from Florida and Pennsylvania. RU is under the direction of
Joe Litterio, an alumnus of the program, who enters his fifth season at the helm and 17
th overall as a collegiate head coach.
Senior
John O'Reilly will make the start on the mound on Opening Day for the second-straight year. The right-hander went seven innings against the Hurricanes last season, allowing two earned runs and ringing up seven strikeouts. He leads the staff with 214.1 innings of experience. Following up, junior
Serafino Brito will take the ball for game two. Also a righty, he has permitted just 20 walks in 132.2 innings, logging six frames in Coral Gables a year ago. The starter for Sunday is still to be determined.
Offensively, RU returns two All-Big Ten selections in fifth-year senior
Chris Folinusz and junior
Nick Matera. Folinusz hit .323 in league play, while Matera collected a .504 slugging percentage with 11 doubles and five home runs on the season. Junior
Jawuan Harris also returns to the lineup coming off a campaign with 23 stolen bases and eight home runs. The Pembroke Pines, Florida, native reached base 9-of-14 plate appearances in last season's series at Miami, blasting two long balls in the Saturday game.
NOTABLE
It will be the 36th consecutive season Rutgers opens the season on the road (last opened at home in 1982 versus Columbia) ... also the 36th straight year the team will play a game in the state of Florida … this series marks the first of five weekends away from Bainton Field to start the campaign … the Scarlet Knights went 16-0 last season when leading after six innings.
THE SERIES
The Hurricanes, who are ranked ninth in the
Perfect Game preseason poll, lead the all-time series, 61-13, dating back to 1967, with all the meetings being played in Coral Gables. The Scarlet Knights took the series finale last season by the score of 17-6. It was the most runs scored and the largest RU margin of victory against the Hurricanes in the 65th all-time meeting. Rutgers had more runs (21-17), hits (28-20), home runs (3-1) and a higher on-base percentage (.362-.342) on the weekend than Miami in 2017.
UP NEXT
The Scarlet Knights will return to Florida to take part in a neutral-site tournament in Port Charlotte. The weekend will start with a non-conference game versus Indiana before taking on St. Bonaventure and Boston College.
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