Baseball

Northwestern is on a hot streak, having won seven of its last 10 games — a complete turnaround from a 2-10 start to the season — but can’t afford to let up.

The Wildcats are currently in 10th place in the Big Ten standings and the end of the conference season — and opportunities to get valuable wins — is fast-approaching.

Northwestern (16-23, 5-7 Big Ten) earned two important wins against Penn State last weekend to move up one spot in the conference standings. Before returning to Big Ten play, however, it will make a stop in Chicago to face local rival Chicago State.

The Cats picked up a 2-0 win in their previous contest against the Cougars (9-28) earlier this season and will look to replicate that success Wednesday.

“Any time we play midweek it’s just making sure that we keep our level of focus,” coach Spencer Allen said.

Chicago State could badly use a win of its own too, however, with just three wins in its last 20 contests.

Although this matchup will not count toward conference standings for NU, a midweek win would be a step in the right direction toward racking up Big Ten wins beginning Friday, senior outfielder Joe Hoscheit said.

“We’re just trying to get some momentum going,” he said. “It’s a one night game, and I’ll take game very seriously.”

On an individual basis, Hoscheit will be looking to continue his recent success at the plate, for which he received back-to-back Big Ten Conference Player of the Week honors. In just the three Penn State games, the senior tallied six RBI and added three runs of his own.

Junior catcher Jack Claeys said the Cats will need to play well on both sides of the ball to secure a win.

“Pitchers just need to keep filling up the zone,” Claeys said. “Hopefully the bats keep going, and if we play solid defense I think we should be in good shape.”

From a pitching perspective, NU has used much of its bullpen in recent games, and Allen said that variety is likely to continue.

Thirteen NU pitchers have appeared in just the last four games, including senior Josh Davis.

Davis, who will start Wednesday, performed strongly in the Cats’ previous midweek game against Milwaukee, facing 15 batters and allowing only two hits. Still, Allen said he plans to use a varied attack to silence the Cougars.

“We’ll probably throw a lot of different arms, mix in a couple different guys in the lineup to hopefully give us that spark,” Allen said. “The weekend games are very intense, and guys are locked in … we just have to make sure we stay locked in against Chicago State.”

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