Demon Baseball | 5/31/2018 5:28:00 PM

CORVALLIS, Oregon – The happy shock of traveling across the country to play in the NCAA Regionals is past. The plane ride to the Pacific Northwest is in the rearview.
 
Now the Northwestern State baseball team can look forward to playing in the national postseason for the first time in 13 years.
 
That time arrives at 9 p.m. Central Friday when the Demons (37-22) open regional play against No. 3 national seed Oregon State (44-10-1) at Goss Stadium. Friday's game can be seen nationally on ESPNU and can be heard on 100.7 FM KZBL and through www.NSUDemons.com.
 
"We're excited to go out and play," second-year head coach Bobby Barbier said. "We're excited to see a different brand of baseball in a different set of circumstances. Hopefully, that won't affect the way we play."
 
Northwestern State enters the four-team tournament, which also includes No. 2 seed LSU and third-seeded San Diego State, as the No. 4 seed, but that has not quieted the Demons' confidence.
 
A 4-0 run at the Southland Conference Tournament extended the Demons' late-season surge, which stands at 16-4 across the final 20 games of the regular season.
 
"We know they're a really good team and have a lot of good players," said senior first baseman David Fry, who was named to Collegiate Baseball magazine's third-team All-American team Thursday morning.
 
"We think we can go out and play with anybody. A lot of the older guys who went to Arizona (in 2016) have experience playing that kind of baseball, and I think that helps us."
 
While the Demons are in regional play for the first time since 2005 – Barbier's junior season – playing in an environment like Goss Stadium is nothing new for Northwestern State.
 
Fry, center fielder Kwan Adkins and catcher Kelsey Richard were part of a Demons squad that took two of three games from Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana, in 2015. Those three, along with pitchers Austin Reich, Nathan Jones and Cullen McDonald, were on the trip to Arizona where Northwestern State won three of four games at the Arizona Wildcat Invitational, including splitting two games with the eventual College World Series runner-up Wildcats.
 
Those trips are meant to give the Demons a chance to step out of their comfort zone and experience something new. In retrospect, they now will serve as a template for a weekend in which NSU could face a top-eight national seed, a familiar rival (LSU) and the Mountain West Conference Tournament champion (San Diego State) in the double-elimination event.
 
"It's West Coast baseball, but we're from the South, so we'll go out there and show them how we play," said Adkins, whose NSU debut came in that series at Notre Dame. "Go have some fun against those guys. I'm comfortable and confident in our team in how we're playing.
 
"The butterflies were bigger (at Notre Dame). Going into this regional, we have nothing to lose and everything to gain. I'm not ready to stop playing baseball. I'm going out there to try to have as much fun as possible."
 
Northwestern State will send left-hander Ridge Heisler (7-2, 3.01) to the mound against a yet-to-be-named Oregon State starter.
 
Heisler has spent all of his first season in a Northwestern State uniform in the weekend rotation, helping the Demons rank 18th nationally in ERA (3.33). He will face an Oregon State lineup that ranks third nationally in batting average (.318).
 
"It's just the game," Heisler said. "You're not really playing the opponent, you're playing the game. No matter where you go, you're playing baseball, which doesn't change much. You go out there and pound the zone, throw quality strikes and give yourself a chance."
 
TV COVERAGE NOTE: The first day of the Corvallis Regional is scheduled to be televised by ESPNU. The final three days of competition will be televised on various networks in the ESPN family.