Boston College Baseball Opens 2013 Season At Country Inn And Suites Elon Invitational

College baseball season is here, you guys. The Boston College baseball team begins the 2013 season down in North Carolina at the Country Inn And Suites Invitational hosted by Elon. The Eagles will face VCU today, Elon on Saturday and Marist on Sunday.

Junior right hander Eric Stevens gets the opening day start against VCU. Sophomores John Gorman (RHP) and Nick Poore (LHP) will start on Saturday vs. host Elon and Sunday vs. Marist, respectively. Last year, Stevens led all Eagles starters in ERA (5.40), OBA (2.78), winning percentage (.714), wins (5), strikeouts (40) and starts (13). Both Gorman and Poore had strong freshman campaigns coming out of the bullpen.

While the Eagles starting lineup features three of nine freshmen, BC does return five of their top 10 hitters from last season, including junior Tom Bourdon (CF), junior John Hennessy (INF), sophomore Blake Butera (SS), senior Matt Paré (C) and Matt McGovern (RF).

As has become customary, the Eagles will one be on one really, really long road trip to start the season. The three-day tournament down at Elon is the start of an 18-game road trip that will BC travel over 9,600 miles before playing its first home game on March 20 against Northeastern. Following this weekend's tournament in Elon, the Eagles will play in the 10th Annual Keith LeClair Classic (Feb. 23-24), Georgia State in St. Petersburg (March 1-3), Florida, USF in Tampa (March 5-6), Florida State in Tallahassee (March 8-10), Georgia Tech in Atlanta (March 15-17) and Holy Cross in Worcester (March 19). Oh, and the annual exhibition game with the Red Sox at JetBlue Park in Fort Myers (February 21).

The Eagles are looking to improve on a 22-33 (10-20 ACC) record from a season ago.

BCEagles.com put together a solid position-by-position preview here as well as this weekend's game notes. Follow @BCBirdball on Twitter for updates throughout the weekend.

Go Eagles!