RUSTON – The Northwestern State baseball team caps its first road swing of the season tonight armed with plenty of information gleaned from a long weekend.
The Demons re-establish their longtime rivalry with Louisiana Tech in Ruston at 6 p.m. on ESPN+. Free streaming audio of the game at J.C. Love Field at Pat Patterson Park will be available through http://www.NSUDemons.com and the Northwestern State mobile app.
Northwestern (5-3) enters the matchup after dropping three of four games at Central Arkansas while earning its lone win of the series in a 15-inning nightcap of Saturday’s doubleheader.
“We continue to discover a lot about our team, and we continue to try to find ways to get the most possible amount of value pulled out of each one of those experiences,” third-year head coach Chris Bertrand said. “That’s regardless of us not being exactly happy with the results on the scoreboard. We are very thankful for what it is we’re able to take away from it. When you look at it, the competitive spirit and the fight that continued to be shown on Friday and Saturday – the idea we picked up another extra-inning win – and the great things we did within the first three games of the season.
“I also think that maybe it was not necessarily a bad thing that we went through what we went through on Sunday in the way we got punched in the mouth a little bit, and we have to learn a lot of things when it comes to responding.”
That chance for the Demons to bounce back comes in a familiar place against a familiar face.
Northwestern makes its first visit to Louisiana Tech (7-1) since May 17, 2024, after the teams were unable to schedule a game in 2025. Tuesday’s matchup is the first of three midweek meetings this season, two of which will take place in Ruston.
The Bulldogs have won all seven of their weekend contests this season with their lone loss coming against McNeese a week ago.
Louisiana Tech swept three games this past weekend, defeating Ohio State twice and host Memphis. Former Demon head coach Lane Burroughs (at NSU 2013-16 as head coach, in 1997-98 as a assistant) has been head coach of the Bulldogs since 2017 and recently became the second-winningest coach in Tech baseball history.
“It’s again the ability to challenge your team against men that you respect and against such a quality ball club in an environment – that we continue to maintain – where each one of those experiences is going to do great things for the building blocks of our program,” Bertrand said. “With everything that Lane Burroughs meant to Northwestern State, and what we obviously think of him as a baseball man and the respect we have for him and the environment they have created – you see it being 7-1 right now. They’re coming off some huge weekend wins with the programs they defeated. We’re going to have a challenge in front of us, and it’s going to be an uphill battle for what the Demons are right now. However, we are very grateful for the opportunity to continue to go out and learn and discover against those teams and men in an environment that, hopefully, the Demons get used to playing in.”
Northwestern will be home this weekend beginning Friday evening for a Southland Conference series with Southeastern.
