The University of Michigan baseball team (2-2) heads back to the west coast to play five games in six days in California, kicking off with a three-game weekend set against Cal State Fullerton (2-2). All three games will be streamed live on ESPN+.

Like Michigan, Cal State Fullerton split its first four games having defeated No. 2 Stanford in their opening game and winning their most recent game on Tuesday (Feb. 21) against Tulane on a walkoff. Fullerton's two losses were part of their opening-weekend series against Stanford, dropping games 7-5 and 21-13 (10 innings). The Wolverines swept Fullerton last year at Ray Fisher Stadium, winning 2-1, 8-2 and 11-10. Michigan and Cal State Fullerton are tied 3-3 in the all-time series, with all of the Wolverines' losses coming in NCAA postseason play. This weekend's series will be Michigan's first at Goodwin Field.

Following their three-game series at Cal State Fullerton, the Wolverines will stay in Los Angeles to play two midweek games -- one at UC Irvine and one at UCLA before heading to Houston for the Shriners College Classic.

The Wolverines opened their 2023 campaign at the MLB Desert Invitational in Arizona, splitting their games with wins over Fresno State and Grand Canyon but falling to UC San Diego and Michigan State. The season opened with a 6-2 win over the Fresno State behind great pitching performances by Connor O'Halloran and Noah Rennard. Michigan then fell to Michigan State 15-8 and UC San Diego 11-2 before rebounding to defeat GCU 6-4 behind a big third inning and another solid Rennard relief appearance.

Michigan was led by its transfers, with both Gabe Sotres and Cody Jefferis making immediate impacts. Both players appeared in all four games, with Sotres starting three out of the four and Jefferis starting all four. Sotres leads the team in batting average, hitting .455 across 11 at-bats while adding two home runs -- the first of his collegiate career. Jefferis batted leadoff and holds a .368 on-base percentage after three hits, three walks and a hit by pitch over the four games. In his second game as a Wolverine, Jefferis accounted for five of the eight runs, scoring twice and batting in three others.

While transfers played a big role last weekend, some familiar bats contributed as well. Tito Flores and Ted Burton are batting .375 with six hits in 16-at bats and three runs. Burton added two home runs to his tally in the season-opening game against Fresno State. Flores, after serving most of last year as the designated hitter, is back in the field as he started all four games in left field.

U-M also had some strong pitching to open the season, led by O'Halloran and Rennard. O'Halloran pitched six innings of two-run baseball, adding four punchouts over the Bulldogs. Rennard held Fresno State and Grand Canyon to one run (unearned) over 6.1 innings with six strikeouts against one walk three hits.

Jacob Denner started the third game and had a solid outing, allowing two runs over five innings. Mitch Voit earned his first career save with a two strong innings of work over Grand Canyon, tallying two strikeouts.

Nine Wolverines made their debuts in the desert. In addition to Jefferis and Sotres, Eamon Horwedel pitched against Michigan State, allowing a run in 1.1 innings of work. Four freshmen made their debuts: Voit, Greg Pace Jr., Jonathan Kim and Brandon Mann. Voit played all four games at third base with Pace starting all four in center field. Two sophomores also made their debuts, with Camden Gasser and Joe Longo. Gasser started two games, one at second base and one at designated hitter, batting .333 with two runs and two hits. Longo also played two games, starting one while scoring a run and tallying two hits with one RBI.