Former Huskie baseball great Scott Simon (2003-07) is being inducted into Athletic Hall of Fame at his alma mater Marian Central Catholic and will be honored Friday night during the school's football game with Immaculate Conception at 7 p.m.

Simon, a native of Algonquin, Ill., is Northern Illinois' all-time leader in hits with 318 and held the Mid-American Conference's record until the 2012 season when Kent State's Jimmy Rider broke the record. He also owns the NIU doubles record.

During his career for the Huskies, Simon was twice named to the Brooks Wallace Award watch list and was a candidate for the Lowe's Senior CLASS Award. Earning All-MAC honors in 2003, as well as Freshman All-America status, he was also a twice named to the Mid-American Conference's All-Academic team.

Prior to NIIU he was the Suburban Catholic League and Northwest Herald Player of the Year during his senior year, when he hit for .536 with six home runs, striking out only five times as the team's captain.

To read more about the Marian Central Catholic Hall of Fame Class, click here.

As you may recall, former Huskie Jake Hermsen became the first NIU baseball player drafted by a Major League Baseball club since 2008 on June 6th. Since then, Hermsen has made five appearances and starts for the Los Angeles Dodgers Rookie League affiliate, Ogden Raptors.

The New London, Wis., native currently owns an 0-2 record and has pitched 24.1 innings this season. However, his record on the mound is not what's turning heads thus far into his Minor League Baseball career. 

In his five starts, Hermsen has only allowed 22 hits, 14 strikeouts, six walks and has only surrendered 10 runs, six of which have been earned. He is second on the team in earned run average (2.22) amongst pitchers with two or more starts (leader has 0.82 in 11 IP) and owns an impressive walks and hits per inning (WHIP) average of 1.15.

Hermsen was drafted in the 28th round by the Dodgers (866th overall) this season, becoming the first Huskie drafted since Bobby Stevens (Baltimore Oriorles, 16th round) and Trevor Feeney (Detroit Tigers, 31st round) were drafted in the 2008 MLB Draft.

Which leads to a perfect segway into the second half of this Huskies Happening.

Stevens, who appeared in NIU games from 2006-08, made his Rookie League debut in 2008 after being drafted and worked his way up through the Orioles farm system, beginning the 2012 season in Triple-A Norfolk, where he played in three games.

After being released by the Baltimore High-A club Fredrick Keys, he was signed by the Lynchburg Hillcats in the same league (Carolina) and has made 14 appearances this season for the team. At the plate he is batting .167 with a home run and five RBI, however, he is batting a combined .246 with his four combined teams during the 2012 season. In his 12 games in the outfield, he has eight putouts and three assists in 12 chances (1 error, .917 fielding percentage).

Jamison Wells stole his 14th base of the season against UIC Tuesday afternoon

Northern Illinois won its home opener Tuesday afternoon against Illinois-Chicago, 8-6, largely in part to a six run second inning. Northern Illinois tacked on two runs in the fourth inning and hit a walloping 13-for-33 (.393) against UIC.

All things considered, I think it was a successful opening day. A good crowd of students, parents and fans came out to Ralph McKinzie Field to support the Huskie baseball team under the sunny 80 degree sky... In March. In fact, it was actually warmer in DeKalb yesterday (83 degrees) than it was in Phoenix, Ariz. (66 degrees). It was a beautiful thing.

Aside from a good crowd in the stands, there was a good crowd in the press box as well to cover the Huskies. Check out some of the links from yesterday's game and another from Saturday afternoon's win against Southern Illinois, the start of NIU's three-game win streak.

NIUHuskies.com - TIMELY AND CONSISTENT HITTING CARRIES HUSKIES OVER FLAMES

http://www.niuhuskies.com/sports/m-basebl/recaps/032012aaa.html

DAILY CHRONICLE - GLANCY WORKS FOR SAVE

http://www.daily-chronicle.com/2012/03/20/glancy-works-for-save/auwciui/?page=1

NORTHERN STAR - BULLPEN HAILS OFFENSE FOR HUSKIES

http://northernstar.info/sports/article_97c4e97c-72f6-11e1-99cf-001a4bcf6878.html

NORTHERN STAR - BASEBALL WINS HOME OPENER

http://northernstar.info/sports/article_0dbddb6e-72f4-11e1-baaa-001a4bcf6878.html

WSIL - SIU BASEBALL BLOWS LATE LEAD

http://www.wsiltv.com/sports/local/SIU-Baseball-Blows-Late-Lead-143077826.html

NIUHuskies.com - NAWROCKI WINS MAC WEST PITCHER OF THE WEEK

http://www.niuhuskies.com/sports/m-basebl/spec-rel/032012aab.html

To fans of baseball there are two words that will always bring a smile to their faces - spring training. It marks the start of the new season. It reminds us of sunshine, the smell of the fresh cut grass and the sound of leather smacking together around rawhide.

For over a century, baseball teams have traveled southbound to get out of the rain, cold and snow to work out the kinks and prepare for the long season's grind in warmer climates. Whether its black and white photos of players in hawaiian shirts, or fictional stories of Walter Matthau's character Morris Buttermaker striking out Ted Williams a la Bad News Bears, fans can't help but smile or be nostalgic over spring training.

After opening the season at Tennessee, the Northern Illinois baseball team is on their longest road stretch of the season, having just concluded a four-game trip in Lubbock, Texas. The team traveled straight from Texas Tech to Surprise, Ariz. for a four-day stretch at the Coca Cola Classic, where the Huskies will meet Arizona State, Oregon State, St. Mary's (Calif.) and Winthrop. (click here for game notes)

With a day to spare before the first game, the Huskies needed to get a practice in on Wednesday afternoon. Though the team had the option of working out at the Surprise Stadium complex, home of the two-time defending American League Champion Texas Rangers and the Kansas City Royals, the team reached out to the Chicago White Sox and obliged to the Huskies, allowing NIU to work out at the complex.

With the team on its own spring training trip right now, I began preparing for next week's notes and found myself in the NIU Media Relations archives to research next week's notes and waist deep in 100-plus years of NIU baseball history. With student worker Mark Scott and myself trying to find results from the 1960's era of Huskie baseball, we found some old photos and a document from the Huskies spring training trips from 1962 and 1965 that I thought were worth sharing.

HISTORY LESSON

First record of the Huskies heading south was in 1951 on a trip to Mississippi and then to Memphis, under then-Head Coach Ralph McKinzie's steady watch. From that year on NIU went almost annually to Louisiana or Mississippi to open its season, generally at the end of march. The '51, enshrined in the Huskie Athletics Hall of Fame, finished the trip down South 3-2 and finished 11-6, en route to the IIAC Championship.

The document in the gallery (the last photo) is a travel itinerary from the team's trip in 1965, where they traveled by train on the Illinois Central's Panama Limited line to Hammond, La., to play at LSU and Southeastern Louisiana.

The itinerary shows the team stayed at Strawberry Stadium on the campus of the Southeastern Louisiana for the first two nights of the trip, before leaving Hammond for New Orleans to play Loyola (La.). The itinerary also shows the team ate in each school's respective cafeteria for meals during the trip.

The photos caught my eye at first because of the old cars parked in front of the stadium, mostly 50's era automobiles. Not to mention a big, giant brick wall that read "Strawberry Stadium" on its backside. The stadium, erected in 1936, is still home to the Lions, but has since been renovated. And of course, the rest and relaxation photos of players laying in the grass and working on their Illinois tan was funny as well. 

For fun, Google the stadium and compare the press box in 1962 to today... Drastic changes! The stadium is but a mere shadow of its former self in many respects.

With the advent of flying from location-to-location in today's world, its hard to imagine teams traveling by train for a long haul trip to play baseball. But, those were the times and I'm sure the trip resonated or still resonates to the guys on the trip. As skipper Ed Mathey said about this year's trip, "It's a day the kids won't soon forget."

Like I said earlier, spring training will always bring a smile to a baseball fan's face. It inspired me to write this posting and share some of the goodies from the archives, along with highlights from yesterday's big day for the Northern Illinois baseball team at Camelback Ranch.

I'd like to close by once again giving a big thank to the Chicago White Sox organization for providing us with video, publicizing us on their website and of course for letting us practice at the facility. 

DAY ONE WITH NIU BASEBALL

Day one of Northern Illinois' first baseball road trip was a simple one - travel. The Huskies travel party of 27 players, four coaches, one special assistant to the coach (Mickey Mathey), one trainer and myself, made the 10.5 hour, 613 mile trek to the Hilton at the Knoxville Airport.

As we boarded the bus, we were handed a sandwich, a bag of potato chips and a bottle of water. The players started the trip with two hours of study hall and the student-athletes took advantage of that. It was quiet and plenty of the players had their required readings in hand. Following the study hall, coach popped Moneyball into the DVD player - naturally, the bus was silent during the flick.

Our first stop of the trip was in Shelbyville, Ind., where we switched bus drivers. And no there wasn't a monorail or a lemon tree (wanted to give a shout for all you Simpsons fans out there). From there we kept on driving and watched Contagion following the first movie. In perfect timing, the movie ended and we stopped in Lexington, Ky. for dinner at Fazzolis, who may or may not have run out of breadsticks and pasta following our arrival. The final movie of the trip was Ides of March. While some watched the movie, a good portion of the team in the back of the bus played multiple games of Mafia until we reached our destination at 10:30 p.m. Eastern time.

The good news is, it's beautiful in Tennessee today. The low temperature here is 10 degrees warmer than the high in DeKalb right now. We're looking at a partly sunny day with 59 degrees - looks like a good day for baseball to me.

THE NEW PLAN

With the high probability of inclement weather on Sunday, the series finale between Northern Illinois and Tennessee has been moved up and the two squads will now play a doubleheader on Saturday beginning at noon.

Both games will be nine-inning contests with approximately 45 minutes in between.

The Huskies and the Vols will kick off the 2012 campaign this afternoon at 3 p.m. Central at Tennessee's Lindsey Nelson Stadium. NIU senior southpaw Tom Barry will take the mound against UT's right-hander Drew Steckenrider.

To watch the Huskies-Volunteers series, visit www.UTSports.com/allaccess and for in game updates follow @NIUAthletics on Twitter.

A NEW ADDITION

For all you Tweeps of @NIUHuskies, you might have seen a new edition to the NIU Twitter family in @NIU_Baseball, run by myself and Assistant Coach Ray Napientek. Be sure to follow us for road trip updates, news, notes, and of course, your occasional laughs. This was a favorite of mine during the trip, with Mike Grindstaff and Ben Neumann playing Bejeweled on an iPad.

With the baseball season only three days away, the Northern Illinois Huskies have some pep in their step heading into the 2012 opener at Tennessee. The Daily Chronicle released its season preview in this morning's edition, talking to Head Coach Ed Mathey and seniors Kyle Glancy, Alex Jones and Troy White. The NIU players made it clear in their interviews what their intentions were this season and Glancy said it best at the end of the article...

"We're feeling confident. It seems like that year we can really go to the next level and win the MAC championship and hopefully get an NCAA berth."