Pitt baseball goes 3-1 on opening weekend

Pitt won its opening contest in the 2016 season with a 19-10 victory against Niagara at the Historic Dodgertown Classic on Friday. The Panthers added three more wins over the weekend to start the season 3-1.

After that Opening Day win, the team defeated Toledo on Saturday, 7-2 and beat Niagara for a second time on Sunday, 5-4. The lone loss came to Ohio State, who defeated Pitt 11-8 in 13 innings on Saturday night. The Panthers got a good start from Aaron Sandefur against the Buckeyes (no earned runs in five innings) but it wasn't enough. Pitt led by a run heading into the ninth inning but the teams scored five combined runs in that frame to send the game to extras where the Panthers eventually lost.

One item of note here is that Pitt didn't use star pitcher T.J. Zeuch. Zeuch is rated as one of the top prospects in college baseball, but for whatever reason, didn't pitch this weekend.

Overall, it's a decent start to the season. Ohio State isn't a great program and, like Pitt, isn't ranked nor receiving any votes. However, with the only hiccup being a 13-inning loss to a major-conference program through four games, that isn't too bad.

With us waiting on spring up here, Pitt will continue playing in the south for a while where the weather is a bit more kind to baseball this time of year. Next up for the team is a three-game series against Grambling State next weekend at Grambling in Louisiana.

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