NATCHITOCHES – Northwestern State will play its final non-conference mid-week game of the baseball season on Wednesday when it hosts Louisiana Tech at 6:30 at Brown-Stroud Field.
 
The game will be a tune-up for a very important Southland Conference series at Nicholls State beginning Friday before the Demons wrap up the regular season at home May 17-19 against Texas State.
 
NSU (17-28) is coming off a league series loss to Central Arkansas over the weekend that saw the Demon offense hit .354 in the three-game set and put up a .425 on-base percentage.  However, the pitching staff struggled with a 12.13 earned run average and allowed the Bears to pound out a .361 batting average.
 
Louisiana Tech (23-23) has been on a roll lately having won five straight games and six of its last seven.  The Bulldogs are coming off a three-game sweep over San Jose State and before that, took two out of three over Hawai'i.
 
Tech is hitting .284 as a team and is led by shortstop Ryan Gebhardt's .342 batting average.  Designated hitter Alex Williams is the team's top power hitter with 11 home runs and 39 RBI to go along with a .320 average.
 
The Demons are led at the plate by center fielder Drew Helenihi's .320 average while OF/1B Will Watson is batting .314.
 
NSU is expected to start freshman lefty Jamie Bittle on the mound.  Bittle is 1-1 with a 4.18 ERA and will be making his 21^st appearance and third start of the season.  In his last start, he threw six scoreless innings and allowed just four hits in a 3-2 win over Louisiana-Monroe back on April 25.
 
This will be the second go-around against the Bulldogs this season.  Tech posted an 8-2 win over the Demons back on March 27 in Ruston.