NC State softball has already played five games, but comes to Raleigh for the first time this season this weekend. With a 4-1 record coming out of Jacksonville, Florida, the Pack stays in familiar territory for the first half of the season before entering ACC play.
A quick recap
The Wolfpack barely finished over .500 in 2021, ending the season with a 26-25 overall record. This season was unique in that the vast majority of games were against tough ACC teams, and NC State ended with a 15-22 conference record. Of the 14 nonconference games, the Pack only dropped three.
“Our goal this year is to win 40-plus games,” said head coach Jennifer Patrick-Swift. “We want to win every series when it comes to the ACC.”
This year, the Pack has 31 nonconference games and 24 conference games, a jarringly different ratio from its odd schedule a season ago. The Wolfpack will also host an invitational in Raleigh from Feb. 25-27.
A long homestand
With the season’s first five games in the books, the Wolfpack now enjoys 13 straight games at home, followed by just a single trip to Elon before another homestand of just four games. This is similar to 2020, where the Pack enjoyed 20 straight games at home, going 17-3.
Of course, that was two years ago with a different team and different opponents. The Wolfpack Classic lasts three days and invites three different opponents to play five games. The home opener will be on Feb. 18 against Lehigh.
Next, the Pack hosts UNC-Greensboro on Feb. 22. The Wolfpack will look for redemption, as its last meeting with the Spartans ended in a 2-1 loss back in 2019. Following that matchup, the Pack will host the NC State Invitational, hosting three teams across three days and six games. Bowling Green, Central Connecticut State, and Delaware will contend with the Wolfpack.
The final two games before ACC play come against Villanova and at Elon. Villanova offers the last game of the 13-game homestand on March 1.
ACC play begins
NC State hosts Syracuse March 4-6 as the first ACC series of the season. The Wolfpack has not seen the Orange since 2019, but will have home-field advantage once again to begin conference play. The Pack breaks from ACC contention for a single game against NCCU at home, rounding off the four-game homestand.
After that, the Wolfpack travels to Durham to take on a competitive and fierce Duke team. Last year, Duke went 44-12 overall and 26-10 in the ACC including four wins against NC State in Raleigh, two of those losses being shutouts. NC State will have a tough time taking on Duke as the first away series of the season, but fortunately for the Pack, it does not get much harder than that. The three games will be played March 11-13.
“The game doesn’t know,” Patrick-Swift said. “It doesn’t know if you’re playing the No. 1 team in the country or the No. 400 team in the country. It doesn’t know and it doesn’t care. The team that goes out and plays the best is the team that’s going to win that day.”
The Pack then hosts Virginia in Raleigh on March 18-20. Virginia had a depressing 2021 season, going 15-33 overall and 10-27 conference. Despite the record, the Cavaliers managed to split a four-game series with the Wolfpack in Charlottesville, Virginia. With home field advantage this time around, and only three games in this season’s series, State should have better luck winning the series and making up for any losses against Duke. After Virginia, NC State will play Campbell in Raleigh to round off the home visit.
Next, the Tar Heels will host NC State in Chapel Hill from March 25-27. Even after a 4-2 Wolfpack win over the Heels in the first round of the 2021 ACC Championships, the rivals did not face off in the regular season. Even though the Pack went 3-12 in away games last season, it is unclear how NC State will fare in Chapel Hill this year.
The Wolfpack then returns to Raleigh for six straight games from March 29-April 6, hosting UNC-Wilmington, UNC-Charlotte, Louisville and Longwood. The Pack barely beat UNC-W and Louisville in previous seasons, and even tied against Longwood in 2019. This stretch of games will be tough for the Wolfpack, but a familiar Raleigh scene may help ease the pressure.
The away stretch
After the stretch from Wilmington to Longwood, 10 out of the following 11 games in the season will be away games. The Pack starts off in Columbia, South Carolina, trading games against East Tennessee State and South Carolina on April 8 and 9. Then it will travel to Atlanta to take on Georgia Tech in ACC competition. Last year, Georgia Tech went 20-26 overall and 11-19 ACC, similar to NC State’s record. The Pack won three out of the four games against the Yellow Jackets last year, but those came at home, meaning the away series could provide a challenge.
The Pack visits home for one game against East Carolina, then will keep heading north to Massachusetts to play Boston College. Boston College did not fare very well last year, going 13-32 overall and 8-24 conference. The Wolfpack lost its conference opener in a 1-0 pitchers’ duel against the Eagles last season.
The final homestretch
The final five games of the season will be in Raleigh on April 27 and May 6-8. First, the Pack has a doubleheader against Norfolk State in nonconference competition. Then, NC State will round off the season with a three-game series against Florida State. FSU went 49-13-1 overall and 26-5-1 in the conference last season. The Wolfpack won only one of its four games against the Seminoles last year, but with home advantage, the Pack may have better luck positioning itself to make noise in the postseason.
“We want to win every series when it comes to the ACC,” Patrick-Swift said. “We want to be making sure we’re going to tournaments having at least four to five [series] wins.”
The ACC tournament this year is May 11-14 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The Wolfpack beat UNC in the first round in 2021 but lost to FSU in the second, so it will look to make a longer postseason run this time around.
