BOONE, N.C. – App State Baseball will open Sun Belt play on Friday, as the Mountaineers welcome in the 2025 national runner-up Coastal Carolina Chanticleers to Smith Stadium for a three-game series. The Chanticleers are ranked No. 16 in this week's top-25 rankings and are coming off a mid-week victory against No. 12 Wake Forest on Tuesday. The Mountaineers will celebrate the 40
th anniversary of the 1986 NCAA Regional team this weekend. First pitch on Friday is set for 6 p.m. with the middle game of the series slated for 3 p.m. on Saturday. The series wraps up on Sunday with first pitch set for 1 p.m. in the finale. All three games will be broadcast on ESPN+.
SCOUTING THE MOUNTAINEERS
App State (10-6) is coming off a midweek loss to Western Carolina on Tuesday, which snapped the Mountaineers three-game winning streak. Four of App State's six losses this season have come by just one run.
Drew DuPont leads the Mountaineers at the plate. The transfer from Lake Land College is batting .400 with seven extra-base hits and a team-high 18 RBIs. As a team, the Mountaineers are batting .296 with 17 home runs in 16 games. On the mound, Friday starter
Nick DiRito has struck out 31 batters in 18.2 innings, posting a 2.89 ERA, while Saturday arm
Gage Peterson is 3-0 with a 1.64 ERA and 32 strikeouts in 22 innings. The pitching staff has lowered its ERA to 4.80 on the season and has struck out 175 batters in 140.2 innings this season (11.2 K/9).
SCOUTING THE CHANTICLEERS
Coastal Carolina (10-6) is coming off a victory over No. 12 Wake Forest on Tuesday, its second ranked win of the season. The Chanticleers won 26 consecutive games last season on the way to the College World Series Final, before falling to LSU. Coastal Carolina has run into some bad injury luck to begin the season, losing closer Dominick Carbone for the season, and starters Cameron Flukey and Hayden Johnson for several weeks. The Chanticleers are led at the plate by Dean Mihos who is batting .385. The Chanticleers have played a lot of small ball this season, stealing 26 bases and tallying 14 sac bunts. Friday starter Luke Jones leads the way on the mound with a 2.33 ERA, while Ross Norman is coming off eight innings of one-run ball last Saturday against ECU. The Chanticleers were picked to repeat as Sun Belt champions, garnering 12 of 14 first place votes in the preseason.
SERIES HISTORY
Coastal leads the all-time series with App State 18-6, following a series sweep in Conway last year. In 2024, the Mountaineers took two of three from No. 13 Coastal Carolina in Boone that clinched the Mountaineers' first weekend series win against a top-15 opponent since a memorable 2012 road trip to No. 7 LSU. App State also defeated No. 8 Coastal 11-0 in 2023, behind a program-record 15 strikeouts from Xander Hamilton in eight one-hit innings.
NATIONAL RECOGNITION
Four App State Baseball players have garnered national recognition heading into the 2026 season.
Nico Soul was projected to be the No. 1 impact freshman in the Sun Belt,
Gage Peterson (31) and
Carter Stanford (48) were both projected as top 50 draft prospects within the conference, while
Tanner Nolan was ranked as the 153rd best starting pitcher across Division I baseball. The recognition has continued into the season, as
Jonathan Xuereb was named to the Brooks Wallace Award Watch List, given to the top shortstop in college baseball, on March 4 and Peterson was named to the National Pitcher of the Year Watch List on March 11.
GAS FROM GAGE
Right-handed pitcher
Gage Peterson has been sensational for the Mountaineers through four starts this season. Peterson struck out a career-high 11 batters, while walking just two across six innings on Saturday. All three runs he allowed were unearned. Peterson is 3-0 this season with a 1.64 ERA and has struck out 32 batters in 22.0 innings of work, which ranks second in the Sun Belt and 24th nationally. The JuCo transfer from Walters Peterson posted an 11.98 K/9 across two seasons at the junior college level and sits at 14.95 this season. He did not allow an earned run in his first 13 innings of work this season and has given up just four earned runs total on the year. Peterson was named to the National Pitcher of the Year Watch List on Wednesday.
THE WAY THEY DREW IT UP
Outfielder
Drew DuPont has paced the Mountaineers at the plate this season. The transfer from Lake Land College is slashing .400/.493/.617 with seven extra-base hits and 18 RBIs in 16 games. He registered an eight-game on-base streak from Feb. 20 – March 1, driving in a run in all eight games. DuPont tallied a five-hit game against Gardner-Webb on Friday, marking just the fourth five-hit game by a Mountaineer in the Sun Belt era (Austin St. Laurent (2), Luke Drumheller). He has hit safely in 14 of 16 games.
FLAMIN' HOT DIRITO
After early-season dominance out of the bullpen,
Nick DiRito was moved into the Friday spot in the rotation last weekend. The UMass Lowell transfer struck out seven while walking just one and conceded just two earned runs over five innings. DiRito has struck out 31 batters while walking just five (6.2 K:BB) this season. The righty owns a 14.9 K/9 rate on the year.
ALL ABOUT SOUL
Freshman
Nico Soul has homered in all three midweek contests this season. He belted his first collegiate home run over the batter's eye Feb. 17 at Duke to lead off the ballgame and followed with a game-tying blast at ETSU on Feb. 24 at ETSU. Against Wake Forest on Wednesday, Soul tallied a three-hit game, finishing a triple shy of the cycle. He ignited the six-run fourth with a 446-foot home run to straight away center field. Soul owns a .889 OPS this season and leads the team with four home runs overall. A three-time all-state selection at Marvin Ridge High School (N.C.), Soul was named the top impact freshman in the Sun Belt by D1Baseball leading into the season.
ZAMORA'S SURGE
After a slow start to the season,
Joseph Zamora broke out with a big series against Presbyterian. The second baseman went 9-for-13, with a double, two triples, a home run, six RBIs and seven runs scored, raising his average from .250 to .351. The third-year Mountaineer was named the Sun Belt Conference's preseason all-league second baseman. Zamora is batting .333 on the season and sports a .453 on-base percentage, thanks to nine walks and five hit by pitches.
XUEREB NAMED TO BROOKS WALLACE WATCH LIST
Redshirt junior shortstop
Jonathan Xuereb was named to the Brooks Wallace Award Watch List, which was announced by the College Baseball Hall of Fame on March 4. The year-end award is given to the top shortstop in college baseball. Xuereb has hits in all ten games played this season, batting .342 (15-for-43) to, with three doubles and eight RBIs. It marks the second consecutive season that a Mountaineer has garnered this recognition, after
Tyler Lichtenberger was named to the midseason watch list in 2025.
2-WAY STANDOUT
Steven Smith has impressed for the Mountaineers in the early season – both at the plate and on the mound. The transfer from Division III Emory and Henry is batting .346 (18-52) with five doubles, three home runs and 15 RBIs. Smith hit his first home run of the season on Feb. 20 against North Carolina A&T and followed with a walk-off home run on Feb. 21 in a run-rule win. He has also pitched for the Mountaineers this season tossing 5.0 scoreless innings across four appearances. He is the first two-way player for the Mountaineers since Andrew Terrell and Phillip Cole pitched and hit in 2021.
BRINGING THE WIFF
App State pitching has struck out 168 batters this season, the second-most in the Sun Belt. The Mountaineers staff owns an 11.2 K/9 rate this season, a major jump from the Mountaineers 7.7 K/9 rate from a season ago.
BASE THIEFS
App State has been very aggressive start to the season, stealing 25 bases in 35 tries through 15 games played. The Mountaineers' offense has not been predicated on base stealing in recent years as the team went 35-for-48 across 54 games last season. Under
Kermit Smith, the Mountaineers most aggressive running seasons have been their winningest seasons as the team stole 73 bases in 2023 (30 wins) and 71 bases in 2024 (33 wins). App State is on pace to steal 84 bases this year. App State has stolen over 100 bases in a season just three times in program history, with their program-record 137 coming in 1974.
SUPERB SUN BELT
The Sun Belt continues to be one of the top conferences in college baseball. Coastal Carolina was the College World Series runner-up a season ago, falling to LSU. Southern Miss joined the Chanticleers in hosting a regional in 2025. The league sent four teams to regionals in 2022 through 2024 and has done so six times since 2000. Southern Miss is ranked 7th in this week's top-25 poll, with Coastal ranked 16th. The Golden Eagles rank as the top team in the nation in RPI, while the Sun Belt as a whole ranks sixth nationally.
UP NEXT
The Mountaineers will visit High Point on Tuesday in what will mark their 15
th game in their last 17 against an opponent from North or South Carolina. The Panthers are 10-7 on the season and are red hot, taking two of three games from No. 9 Florida last weekend and following it up with a mid-week victory over Duke. They will visit USC Upstate this weekend before hosting App State on Tuesday at 6 p.m. The game will be broadcast on ESPN+.
