The North Shore Navigators have announced their schedule for the upcoming New England Collegiate Baseball League (NECBL) season, featuring 21 home games at historic Fraser Field. NECBL Commissioner Sean McGrath and Navs President & General Manager Derek January made Thursday’s announcement.
North Shore returns to its original summer collegiate home in the NECBL for the first time since 2011. The season and home opener is set for Friday, June 4 when the Vermont Mountaineers travel down from Montpelier to Lynn for a 6:35 p.m. first pitch.
Home games at Fraser throughout the summer of 2021 are scheduled to begin at 6:35 p.m. on Monday through Saturday nights and 4:05 p.m. on Sundays.
For the 2021 campaign, the 14 NECBL organizations will play a 42-game regular season exclusively within seven-team North and South Divisions. Slotted into the North Division, the Navs will play seven games each against Vermont, the Keene (N.H.) Swamp Bats, North Adams (Mass.) SteepleCats, Sanford Mainers, Upper Valley Nighthawks (White River Junction, Vt.) and Winnipesaukee Muskrats (Laconia, N.H.).
North Shore’s 21-game home slate includes four Friday, three Saturday and four Sunday contests including visits from Sanford and Winnipesaukee on Saturday, July 3 and Sunday, July 4, respectively. As part of the balanced schedule, the Navs will play four of their seven contests against North Adams, Winnipesaukee and Upper Valley at home, while Keene, Sanford and Vermont come to Lynn three times each.
The 2021 NECBL All-Star Game will be held on Sunday, July 18 at Cardines Field in beautiful Newport, R.I. After that, the league’s teams will play two final weeks of the regular season with hopes of qualifying for the 2021 NECBL Playoffs, of which the format will be announced at a later date.
The regular season is scheduled to end on Sunday, Aug. 1, with the following day left open for makeup games. The postseason will begin on Tuesday, Aug. 3.
The Navs – a charter member of the New England League’s inaugural season dating back to 1994 – rejoin the NECBL this summer after a nine-year hiatus. The Navigators began their NECBL tenure as a charter member based out of Middletown, Conn., where they won three consecutive NECBL championships as the Middletown Giants from 1997-99. Since then, no team has repeated that feat.
Following a three-year stint as the Holyoke (Mass.) Giants, the team relocated to the North Shore in 2008. The Navs qualified for the NECBL postseason in four straight seasons and won a fourth Fay Vincent Sr. Cup in 2010.
Season passes, which admit two people to each Navs home game, are now on sale for $95.50 and can be purchased by clicking here. Contact Maggie Barden ([email protected]) for further ticket information or questions.
Stay up to date on the latest Navs news by visiting nsnavs.com and following the team on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.