{"id":163106,"date":"2026-02-13T12:21:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-13T12:21:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/163106\/"},"modified":"2026-02-13T12:21:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T12:21:07","slug":"mavericks-open-2026-season-at-northwestern-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/163106\/","title":{"rendered":"Mavericks Open 2026 Season at Northwestern State"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\n UTA Baseball @ NSU Game Notes<\/a>
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ARLINGTON, TEXAS\u00a0\u2013 The UT Arlington baseball team opens the 2026 season on the road with a three-game series against Northwestern State at Brown-Stroud Field, beginning Friday at 6:30 p.m. CT. The series marks the official start of the Mavericks’ second season under head coach Mike Trapasso<\/a> and the debut of a heavily retooled roster featuring 22 newcomers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GAME NOTES\u00a0

\nUTA begins its second season under head coach Mike Trapasso<\/a> after finishing 21-33 overall in 2025 and seventh in the Western Athletic Conference.\u00a0

\nThe Mavericks enter 2026 with a retooled roster that features 22 newcomers alongside returning core contributors including Caylon Dygert<\/a>, Xander McAfee<\/a>, Xavier Melendez<\/a> and Austin Phillips<\/a>.\u00a0

\nThis weekend marks the opening road test of a non-conference slate that includes matchups against Arkansas, Oklahoma, Baylor, Dallas Baptist,\u00a0TCU\u00a0and UTSA.\u00a0

\nUTA’s pitching staff will be led this weekend by projected starters Caylon Dygert<\/a>, Zahradnik and Skolfield as the Mavericks look to set the tone on the mound to open the season.\u00a0

\nOffensively, McAfee returns after ranking among the team leaders last season in batting average, OPS, hits, doubles, triples, home\u00a0runs\u00a0and RBIs among returning players.\u00a0

\nMelendez returns after a .320 season at the plate in 2025 with 56 hits, seven home runs and 37 RBIs, while Tyce Armstrong<\/a> led the club with 11 home runs and 41 RBIs last year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

LIVE COVERAGE\u00a0

\nUTA at Northwestern State\u00a0

\nBrown-Stroud Field | Natchitoches, Louisiana\u00a0

\nFriday \u2013 6:30 p.m. CT\u00a0

\nSaturday \u2013 TBD\u00a0

\nSunday \u2013 1 p.m. CT\u00a0<\/p>\n

Live Stats\u00a0<\/p>\n

ON DECK\u00a0

\nThe Mavericks return to North Texas for their home opener at Globe Life Field against TCU on Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

FOLLOW THE MAVS\u00a0

\nFor the latest news on UTA Baseball, visit UTAMavs.com and follow @UTAMavsBSB across social media platforms.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Story Links UTA Baseball @ NSU Game Notes …\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":163107,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[150,152,151],"class_list":{"0":"post-163106","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arlington","8":"tag-arlington","9":"tag-arlington-headlines","10":"tag-arlington-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=163106"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163106\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/163107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=163106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=163106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=163106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}