The UND baseball team has struggled through its first six weeks of the season, but the month of April offers a plentiful amount of home games and a break from some recent long distance traveling.

North Dakota is now 5-13 as it dropped the first three conference games of the season last weekend on the road against Grand Canyon University in Phoenix, Ariz.

“We missed some opportunities to put the ball in play to generate some runs and extend the game,” UND coach Jeff Dodson said after last Sunday’s loss to Grand Canyon. “We had Alex Twenge on a pitch count on his first start back in three weeks. The bullpen threw pretty well. We just didn’t put much together offensively.”

North Dakota was unable to score more than three runs in each of the team’s three road games in Phoenix as getting on base seems to be an ongoing problem for the club, with the exception of senior Tyler Follis.

Follis registered seven hits on the weekend including three in the series finale last Sunday.

Follis’ .393 average has him sitting fourth in the conference in batting average and his .479 on base percentage is the fifth best in the WAC.

Tyler Follis and his numbers at the plate were familiar. Follis hit above .300 in his first three seasons at North Dakota, and looks to be on track to do it again this year.  He recently had his hitting streak snapped on Mar., 13. He had put the ball into play in 26 straight games, dating back to last season.

UND senior Jeff Campbell also is seeing success at the plate this year. Campbell’s .391 batting average has him among the top-10 in the conference in batting average, slugging percentage at .493 and an on base percentage of .434.

North Dakota will play 12 home games in April. Last season during a similar string of losses, the team played its first home matchups of the season and recorded three consecutive wins against Northern Colorado.

The Green and White will play the first eight of those home games beginning April 2 before going on a five-game road trip and then returning to finish out a seven-game homestand that will stretch into the beginning of May.

The team will play its first home series against Bakersfield at Kraft Memorial Field. Before its large amount of home games in April, North Dakota still has to finish out March on the road against Northern Colorado, a team that has won its first three conference games of the season.

UND currently is on a four-game losing streak and will look to get back on track on the road against Northern Colorado before returning to Grand Forks, where it will play nine conference games with on its home field.

Ben Novak is a staff writer for The Dakota Student. He can be reached at [email protected].