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In 2025, Northeastern ranked first in the country in ERA (3.06), WHIP (1.07), and shutouts (17) under head coach Mike Glavine and pitching coach Kevin Cobb.
To say this domination on the mound was a pleasant surprise would be an understatement. Just one year prior, the pitching staff surrendered 501 hits in 483 innings for a 5.22 ERA, and the turnaround was nothing short of staggering.
Glavine, however, is careful not to frame last season through numbers alone.
“I’ll just focus on the behind-the-scenes, the not-so-obvious, no-stats stuff: culture, work ethic, grind, grit, toughness, compete,” he said. “That team had it all. Stats are easy to see, but the culture pieces and the type of team we were off the field can be just as important as on the field.”
That perspective matters because it reframes what carries forward. Historic seasons don’t repeat themselves cleanly, especially in college baseball, where sustained dominance is often paid for in attrition on draft night. What can carry over, however, is the cultural standard that produced it.
Before looking ahead, it’s necessary to take stock of what walked out the door, particularly with all four starters and top three relievers from that remarkable 2025 staff not returning for 2026.
Northeastern addressed that reality directly when fall workouts began.
“In our first meeting in September, I brought it up to the guys — not that they didn’t know it — that we lost 90% of our innings,” Glavine said. “Which comes with great opportunities for everybody in that room. That was the message in our opening meeting. There are opportunities here.”
The Departures
LHP Max Gitlin pitched one season with Northeastern after transferring from Clark (D-III) and quickly emerged as the midweek starter. Despite a mid-80s fastball that limited him to a modest 5.4 K/9, the southpaw’s pinpoint command carried him to a stellar 2.49 ERA across 50.2 innings (0.987 WHIP). Of all the championships and records that defined the Huskies’ 2025 season, few moments were more memorable than Gitlin standing two outs away from a perfect game against UConn — 25 batters up, 25 batters down — before the bid was finally broken up and ended in a complete game shutout. Gitlin graduated in May.
LHP Will Jones followed a 5.23 ERA in 2024 with a 2.63 mark across 72 frames in 2025, constantly setting the tone for weekend series as the Friday starter. Perhaps the biggest factor in his success was keeping the ball down in the zone, allowing just three round-trippers compared to six in 42.1 innings a year earlier. Jones graduated in May.
RHP Aiven Cabral was a three-year rotation mainstay. In 2024, Cabral’s ERA ballooned north of 7.00 after a dominant freshman season. However, Cabral made a few adjustments to his breaking balls during the 2024 summer and became a Cape Cod Baseball League All-Star before assuming the role of Northeastern’s Saturday starter in 2025. In his final year of college baseball, he twirled a team-high 89.1 innings to a 2.92 ERA and 0.3 HR/9. The Atlanta Braves selected Cabral in the 18th round of the 2025 MLB Draft.
LHP Jordan Gottesman leaves the biggest rotational hole after cementing himself as Glavine’s Sunday starter with a historic 9-2 record and 2.27 ERA in 83.1 frames, eighth in D-I Baseball among qualified pitchers. Of Northeastern’s four starters, Gottesman had the highest K/9 (10.5) and lowest H/9 (5.4) and WHIP (0.867). To put it simply, the southpaw was unhittable. The San Francisco Giants selected Gottesman in the sixth round of the 2025 MLB Draft.
RHP Charlie Walker became Glavine’s bread and butter in long relief and led the bullpen with a 1.29 ERA across 48.2 innings. Walker had the lowest WHIP (0.719) on the pitching staff by a wide margin, largely due to tight command of all three of his pitches (0.9 BB/9). After a strong summer for the Cotuit Kettleers of the CCBL, the San Diego Padres signed Walker as an undrafted free agent.
RHP Cooper McGrath dominated in shorter relief stints, tossing 21.2 innings to a 1.66 ERA. Despite a contact-first approach, McGrath did not allow a single home run and kept the ball down in the zone for quick groundball outs. The San Francisco Giants selected McGrath in the 18th round of the 2025 MLB Draft.
RHP Brett Dunham turned heads in 2025 after gaining command of his fastball and hurling 29.1 innings to a 1.84 ERA. In 2024, Dunham held a passable 4.43 ERA, with most of the damage self-inflicted (4.9 BB/9). However, in his senior season, the right-hander posted a 0.852 WHIP and lowered his BB/9 to 2.5 with control of his heater. Dunham graduated in May.
RHP Jack Beauchesne had a disappointing senior season but will undoubtedly be missed. A four-year Husky, Beauchesne became Glavine’s bread and butter at the closing role in 2024 with a 2.82 ERA and 22.1 innings. In his final collegiate campaign, Beauchesne — like the rest of the pitching staff — had stellar command (1.8 BB/9). However, opponents hit him hard (9.4 H/9), pushing his ERA just south of 6.00 in 15.1 frames. Beauchesne graduated in May.
LHP Jack Bowery posted a 4.96 ERA as a junior and followed with a much-improved 3.47 mark across 57 innings as a senior. Bowery added much-needed spot starts in his two years in Brookline while eating innings in long relief in an otherwise right-handed heavy staff. Bowery graduated in May.
The Returners
The list of departures is long, but opportunities arise. Northeastern returns 13 pitchers for the 2026 season, many of whom spent last spring operating on the margins of a historically dominant staff. In 2025, rotation spots were fixed, leverage innings were scarce, and development often occurred without game action, simply because there was little need to deviate from what was working.
That environment limited opportunity, not growth, and with so much production now gone, 2026 becomes a proving ground for the following arms to assimilate into meaningful roles.
“Strength in numbers,” Glavine said. “I think we’re really deep. We lack experience, but I know they’re talented. I know they work really hard. There’s velocity, spin, lefties, righties, and different slots. I’m really high on this pitching staff right now.”
LHPs Max Marchetti, David McSweeney, and Cam Keaveney are Northeastern’s returning left-handed depth, representing a mixed bag of youth and inexperience as two redshirt sophomores and one redshirt freshman who have yet to throw a pitch at the collegiate level. In a right-handed heavy staff, even incremental contributions from this trio would carry outsized importance and give Glavine additional matchup flexibility and balance.
RHPs Andrew Basel, Angel Cruz, and Andrew Rogovic are three sophomores who combined for just 10.2 frames in 2025. With the pitching staff operating like clockwork, there was no need to accelerate their development in game situations, leaving them largely on the periphery of an already-set staff. That luxury no longer exists. All three enter 2026 in line for expanded roles, with Cruz set to compete for a starting spot.
RHP Jack Cropper enters 2026 as a redshirt sophomore. In his first year of collegiate action, he struggled in a limited sample with a 9.45 ERA in 6.2 frames. Cropper did post a 12.2 K/9, a trend that continued during the summer with the Newport Gulls in the New England Collegiate Baseball League, but with difficulty limiting free passes (13 walks in 7.1 innings). The raw stuff is evident. The next step is command, and if Cobb can help Cropper harness it the way he did across the 2025 staff, the former 2023 Massachusetts No. 1-ranked pitching prospect has a chance to turn eye-catching peripherals into real production.
RHPs Nick Coniglio and Joseph Hauser will start their junior seasons with the program looking for more consistent time on the mound. The pair pitched a combined 11.1 innings in their first two collegiate seasons. However, both pitched with volume in the NECBL over the summer; Hauser tossed 30 frames to a 2.70 ERA for the North Shore Navigators, while Coniglio threw 25 innings for the Mystic Schooners to a 7.56 ERA. A summer workload will not guarantee roles, but it does provide a foundation that could prove valuable.
RHPs Ryan Griffin, Ryan McCarroll, James Morice, and Carson Walsh each enter their final year of eligibility looking to provide veteran leadership to a pitching staff that lost much of its established core. Walsh made the biggest impact of the four in 2025 with a 3.72 ERA in 9.2 frames. Griffin, McCarroll, and Morice only combined to throw 21.1 innings in 2025, and their workloads will undoubtedly increase as three arms with experience in an otherwise young pitching staff. Glavine will likely deploy the quad in expanded, multi-inning relief assignments.
The Arrivals
Northeastern brings in five freshmen and four transfer hurlers for the 2026 campaign. There are two ways to look at this.
On one hand, newcomers offer developmental runway, while transfers bring proven collegiate experience and the ability to handle innings right away. On the other hand, freshmen development is rarely linear, and transfers often face an adjustment period of their own, particularly those stepping up in competition from lower conferences or Division III, where proven skill does not always immediately translate into success.
“I can’t sit here and tell you exactly what it’s going to look like,” Glavine said. “But I expect to use a lot of different guys, keep arms fresh, get guys in and out, and I expect them to prove a lot of people wrong.”
RHPs Cooper Maher, Landon Manzi, and Tom Mahoney are an encouraging group of freshman arms, headlined by Manzi, who arrives with the loudest resume of the bunch as a 14th round (415th overall) draft selection of the Texas Rangers. Manzi spent the 2025 summer with the Norwich Sea Unicorns in the Futures Collegiate Baseball League and struggled with command: across 17.1 innings, Manzi issued 13 walks. If Cobb can work his usual magic in that department, the raw ingredients, particularly the fastball that earned him big league attention out of prep, are already there.
Maher, like Manzi, spent the summer in Norwich, where command also proved to be a hurdle, albeit to a lesser degree. He issued 13 free passes over 20.2 innings, but his main struggles manifested with wildness inside the zone, surrendering 20 hits in those frames.
Mahoney arrives with a different profile. An injury limited him to just 5.1 innings during his senior season. Still, his prep career points to real upside: across his high school career, Mahoney tossed 26 innings to a 1.35 ERA with 48 punchouts. With health restored, he becomes another arm whose development will be worth monitoring early in the spring.
LHPs Scott Longo and Miles Blake round out the incoming freshman pitching class and offer two left-handed options in a staff otherwise light on southpaws.
Longo enters with perhaps the most proven track record against collegiate competition. Before arriving in Brookline, he pitched for the Nashua Silver Knights in the FCBL, where he flashed legitimate swing-and-miss stuff, posting a 3.42 ERA with 36 strikeouts over 23.2 innings (13.7 K/9). A local product out of Milton, Longo earned a 2023 state championship, was a three-time Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association Player of the Year finalist, and collected Bay State MVP honors during his prep career.
Blake arrives after earning Central Massachusetts Player of the Year honors. During his high school career, he posted a ridiculous 1.24 ERA over 45 innings with 81 strikeouts. Opponents batted under .100.
Both southpaws will compete for starting and long-relief roles.
RHPs Andrew Wertz, Luc Rising, Robbie O’Connor, and Matthew Sapienza each bring collegiate experience to the staff.
Wertz offers the clearest bullpen resume after excelling at Salve Regina (D-III), where he posted a 1.33 ERA with 38 strikeouts in 27 innings during his final season and carried that dominance into summer ball. In 2025, he earned a First Team All-NECBL selection, NECBL Reliever of the Year honors, and an All-Star nod after pitching to a microscopic 0.41 ERA across 22 innings for the Valley Blue Sox. Those numbers earned Wertz a postseason spot with the Hyannis Harbor Hawks of the CCBL, and the hurler continued his dominance with 2.2 scoreless frames over two appearances. While his fastball velocity doesn’t jump off the page, the graduate student still profiles as a late-inning, high-leverage option out of the bullpen.
Rising enters his final year of eligibility after three seasons at RIT (D-III), where he earned First Team All–Liberty League honors as a reliever in 2024 and followed that with a Third Team selection in 2025. As a junior, Rising logged 49.1 innings and posted a 3.28 ERA without allowing a home run and limiting extra-base damage. He was equally impressive in the 2025 summer, earning Perfect Game College Baseball League All-Star honors with a 1.85 ERA over 39 innings for the Batavia Muckdogs. Rising will likely be deployed as a long reliever who brings a track record of run prevention.
O’Connor transfers in after two seasons at UMass, where he served as a full-time starter for the Minutemen. While his 2025 numbers (7.71 ERA in 67.2 innings) were rough, his freshman year told a different story and earned him Atlantic 10 All-Rookie honors for posting a 4.72 ERA across 74.1 innings. Durability and experience headline his profile, making him a candidate for rotation depth and bulk innings.
Sapienza — a North Andover native — is the ultimate change-of-scenery arm. Once a highly regarded recruit out of Phillips Academy, Sapienza’s three-year career at Georgetown was interrupted by injury and inconsistency. His freshman season showed promise, with 42 strikeouts against 19 walks in 60 innings, but subsequent years never fully stabilized, totaling 38.2 frames over his final three seasons at Georgetown. Northeastern hopes health and role clarity can unlock the talent that once made him one of Massachusetts’ top-ranked right-handers.
The Verdict
There is no replacing what Northeastern lost on the mound. Not statistically. Not structurally. Not emotionally.
The 2025 pitching staff was a once-in-a-generation convergence of development, health, command, and cohesion that turned a perceived weakness into the defining strength of a 49-win season.
What this staff can be, however, is functional, competitive, and increasingly dangerous as the season progresses.
Northeastern returns 13 pitchers and adds nine more, creating a volatile but intriguing pool of arms. There is upside in the youth. There is experience in the transfers. There is familiarity in the returners who spent last spring waiting behind a locked-in rotation and dominant bullpen. Opportunity has replaced certainty.
But if there’s a through-line worth trusting, it’s this: Cobb has built a track record of turning raw skill into competitive collegiate pitching, and Glavine has constructed staffs that peak when it matters most. The names are different. The blueprint is not.
The 2026 pitching staff doesn’t need to be historic. It needs to be efficient and serviceable.
When paired with an offense capable of carrying weight, that may be all Northeastern needs to remain exactly where it expects to be, hunting for another Beanpot and CAA Championship before playing meaningful baseball in May.
Northeastern begins the 2026 season with three games in Phoenix, Ariz., as part of the MLB Desert Invitational. Max Schwartzberg will provide full broadcast and written coverage of the tournament, with game one against Grand Canyon University scheduled for Friday at 8 pm EST on Sports+.
Max Schwartzberg is a junior at Northeastern and covers hockey, basketball, and baseball in print and on air. He is also a Cape Cod Baseball League announcer for the Hyannis Harbor Hawks. You can read his articles here and follow his Instagram here.