This upcoming weekend, the Massachusetts baseball team will face off against an offensive Temple side in a three-game series.

The Minutemen (9-15, 3-3 A-10) will travel to Skip Wilson Field to take on a struggling Owls (15-14, 2-7 A-10) team and look to improve their standings within the conference.

UMass has lost four of its last five games with a combined score of 35-24. The Owls are in a similarly tough rut, going 1-7 in their last eight games, with four of those losses coming at the hands of A-10 teams LaSalle and Dayton.

While the Minutemen pitching staff has been performing well over the stretch, it has seen had diffculty obtaining much run support to aid the starting pitchers. UMass scored an average of 4.8 runs a game in its past five games, compared to a 6.7 run average in its 10 preceding games.

In addition to a struggling offense, the Maroon and White have been on the wrong end of a few bad innings in recent games. In three of its last four losses, UMass pitching has allowed four runs to score in a single inning each game, and with Temple batters swinging the bat as well as they have been, that could prove to be a problem in a tight game.

The Owls have seen remarkable success at the plate throughout their season, despite their recent drought. As a team, they hold the nation’s top batting average with a (.347). Out of the 10 players that have started in at least 18 games, all but two of them are hitting over .300, with five of those eight batters hitting over .370. By comparison, UMass is hitting .275 as a team.

Though their offense is impressive, one of the Owls’ biggest weaknesses lies in their pitching. Opposing teams are hitting a healthy .313 against Owl hurlers and have really fed off their latest woes. The team’s collective earned run average stands at 5.83, with no starter or reliever holding an ERA below 3.38. The Minutemen, by comparison, are slightly lower on average with a 5.52 team ERA.

David Martin can be reached at [email protected]