EDINBURG, Texas – The Northwestern State baseball team travels to Texas-Pan American on Friday and Saturday to participate in the Al Ogletree Classic for a three-game set that starts with Prairie View A&M at three o'clock Friday afternoon at the Edinburg Baseball Stadium.

NSU (1-3) will play a second game on Friday against UTPA (2-2) at 7 o'clock before the three-game set for NSU concludes with a second game against UTPA as 7 o'clock on Saturday.

The Demons will start right-hander Steven Spann (0-1, 9.00 earned run average) in the first game on Friday, and lefty Hunter Duvic (0-1, 10.86) will make his first start of the season in the second game. The final start of the series goes to right-hander John Gault (1-0, 0.00) against the Broncs.

Prairie View will toss right-hander Jonathan Mata (0-1, 1.50). In the second game of the series, UTPA will start right-hander Sam Street (1-0, 1.29), and righty Matt Harrell (1-0, 1.29) will be the starter in the second game versus NSU.

Both UTPA and PVAMU have faced Southland Conference teams this season. The Broncs split a four-game series with Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, and Houston Baptist swept Prairie View. The Demons will face TAMUCC, but not HBU this season.

"Pan American is better this season. They played last weekend and had a pretty good series," said second-year head coach Lane Burroughs. "We're looking into Prairie View, but we only play them once.

Last season the Broncs and Demons matched up for a three-game series in Brown-Stroud Field, and NSU won the series 2-1.

"This is a big weekend and we're excited about it," he said. "I told the guys that it's rolling now and there's not letting up now. We're in the season, and this is the fun part of our year."

NSU comes in after a tough 5-3 loss to No. 14 Louisiana-Lafayette at home on Wednesday. ULL jumped out to a 4-0 lead by the top of the fifth inning, and Northwestern State answered with three in the bottom of the fifth. From there, the Cajuns were able to hold NSU.

Cort Brinson, who is out with an injury, leads the Demons in hitting with a .364 hitting average. Regan Kafuman (.333), C.J. Webster (.308), and Edwin Gomez (.300) are all hitting .300 or better from the plate. Chase Daughdrill leads the team in runs batted in with four and Kaufman follows with three.

Victor Garcia leads UTPA in hitting at .545 in three starts this season, and Alberto Morales has a .400 average. Alex Howe leads the team in RBIs wit three followed by four players who have two.

Robert Cossey (.550), Cody Den Beste (.333) and Dominiq Harris (.316) lead Prairie View in hitting, and Harris leads the Panther with five runs knocked in.

Northwestern State will play one more on the road at Southern on Wednesday before hosting eight straight at home. Southern will play a weekend, three-game series at Brown-Stroud Field followed by the much-anticipated game versus LSU on March 4.