Willamette Baseball Series with Whitworth will be played at Neutral Sites

By Robert McKinney, Assistant Athletics Director, Communications

SALEM, Ore -- The three-game Northwest Conference series scheduled for this weekend between Willamette University and Whitworth Univesity will be played at neutral sites due to wet grounds at John Lewis Field.

The Bearcats and the Pirates will open the series with a doubleheader at Santiam Christian School in Adair Village, Oregon, on Saturday, March 3. The first game is set for 11 a.m. (PST) with the second game to start at about 2 p.m. On Sunday, Willamette and Whitworth will play the final game of the series at Roy Helser Field on the Linfield College campus in McMinnville, Oregon. Game time is slated for 12 p.m.

Willamette is 7-7 on the season and 3-3 in the NWC. The Bearcats were victorious in the first and third games of their NWC series at Pacific University this past weekend. Willamette won the first game, 2-1 in 10 innings, and the Boxers prevailed in the second game, 4-3. The Bearcats rolled to a 15-5 win in the third game.

Whitworth brings a 5-6 overall record into the series. The Pirates were rained out of their first NWC games of the season this past weekend in Spokane, Washington, where they were scheduled to play Whitman College three times.

Last year, Willamette and Whitworth were two of the four teams that qualified for the 2017 NWC Baseball Tournament. The Bearcats defeated the Pirates, 13-8, during the tournament Willamette fell to Linfield in the championship game.