The unofficial mantra of baseball Opening Day: Hope springs eternal.

The Sacred Heart University baseball team springs into a new era this weekend, as the Pios open the 2023 campaign with a three-game non-conference series at UNC Asheville. The weekend marks the collegiate head coaching debut of Pat Egan, himself a former Northeast Conference Pitcher of the Year.

No streaming options are available for the series, but UNC Asheville will provide live stats coverage of all three games.

***UPDATE (3 p.m. Wednesday): All three games are now scheduled for noon starts. The games on Friday and Saturday will be held at the Big League Camp facility in Marion, N.C., while Sunday's series finale will take place on the UNC Asheville campus, at Greenwood Baseball Field in Asheville, N.C. This represents a location and time change for Friday's game.

A LOOK AT THE PIOS
Sacred Heart (12-41 in 2022) returns its lone All-NEC performer from a year ago, as graduate student Justin Jordan is back for his fifth and final tour of duty with the Pios. The Darien, Conn., native slashed .351/.391/.448 with 12 doubles last spring and boasts a career on-base percentage of .405. Sam Mongelli (NECBL) and Dante D'Amore (Hamptons) both return to the red and white after making All-Star appearances in their summer leagues. The former hit .304/.386/.471 with five dingers in a breakout season last spring, while the latter will look to build on a 2022 debut campaign where he posted a .262/.366/.377 slash line.

SCOUTING THE BULLDOGS
UNC Asheville (21-29-1 in 2022) finished third in the Big South a year ago. Southpaw reliever Justin Honeycutt is back for his junior season in the Land of the Sky, after posting a 1.73 ERA over 52 innings of work to pick up All-Big South First Team honors last season. Robbie Burnett used a .322/.416/.481 debut season with eight doubles and five homers to earn All-Big South Honorable Mention and All-Freshman Team accolades, and is expected to see time at multiple positions in 2023. 

ON THE MOUND
Senior right-hander Jack Kramer is expected to get the Opening Day nod for the Pios, with junior right-hander Jake Babuschak likely to follow on Saturday. Kramer showed promise in striking out 26 over 27.2 innings in his junior campaign, but will need to cut down on the 24 walks and seven hit batsmen he issued along the way as well. Babuschak struck out 45 over 60 innings as a freshman in 2021, but saw opponents hit .315 against him as a sophomore last spring.

UNC Asheville is likely to counter with senior right-hander Ryan Douglas in one of the games. Douglas struck out 55 over 59.1 innings last season, but also surrendered seven long balls on the way to a 5.31 ERA. The only other returning Bulldog to start at least five games in 2022 is sophomore left-hander Cole Schiff, who posted a 10.80 ERA over 21.2 innings a year ago.

NICE TO MEET YOU
The two programs have no prior history with each other. The weekend series will mark the first-ever meetings between Sacred Heart and UNC Asheville on the baseball diamond. 

NEXT UP
It's back down south next weekend for the Pios, though not quite as far. SHU will head to Richmond, Va., for a three-game series against Virginia Commonwealth on Feb. 24-26.