Two cold weather teams that have been heating up will knock heads tomorrow, as the Penn State baseball team travels to Wilmington to meet Delaware for a noon doubleheader at Bob Hannah Stadium.

The Nittany Lions, who are on a three-game winning streak, and the Blue Hens, on a four-game tear heading into last night's matchup with Rider, will also play at noon Sunday.

"To us it's kind of a big series," said first-year Delaware baseball coach Jim Sherman. "We haven't played Penn State for many years -- we're excited about it."

Penn State (6-11) has struggled throughout most of the season, mainly because of a lack of hitting. Delaware (5-5) has had little trouble with the bats, hitting .522 as a team, but has suffered from pitching that Sherman described as "average at best."

Taking the hill for the Hens tomorrow will be junior right-hander Rich McGuire (2-1, 6.86 ERA) in Game 1 and sophomore righty Jason Vincent (2-0, 4.87) in Game 2. Sherman said Sunday's starter has yet to be determined.

Penn State will counter with a three-man rotation of junior Justin Nash , freshman David Aardsma and either seniorDan McCall or freshman Aaron Tressler.

"We'd like to win two out of three, but we hope we have enough pitching to matchup with Penn State," Sherman said.

The Lions are still trying to find the spark that helped them to 45 wins a year ago, and are hoping to build upon the last three games during Spring Break.

"I was pleased with us taking three out of four at the tail end," Penn State baseball coach Joe Hindelang said. "We started to hit the ball and put a few things together."

And although it's still early in the year, this is shaping up as a key series for the Lions, who want to have some momentum heading into their conference opener at Indiana next weekend. Is Penn State ready to kick it into the next gear?

"I think we'll be able to tell this weekend," said junior infielder Chris Wright.

Wright, who is hitting .545 over the last three games, figures to be a tough out for the Blue Hens, while Penn State will have to focus on making sure senior OF Chris Kolodzcey (.415, 4 homers, 12 RBI) and senior IF Peter Maestrales (.432, 3, 16) don't do too much damage.

"Kolodzey is the ultimate coach's dream," Sherman said. "How Chris goes is kind of how we go."