COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – Seventeen months after the University of Colorado Colorado Springs announced intentions to start a baseball program, the Mountain Lions will play the first game in program history on Thursday with two-time defending national semifinalist and sixth-ranked Cal Poly Pomona. The Mountain Lions and Broncos will open the 2017 season at 7 p.m., MST, from Soclinos Field in Pomona, Calif.

UCCS announced the addition of baseball to the University of Colorado Board of Regents on Sept. 10, 2015, and Dave Hajek was named Head Coach on Nov. 24. Hajek announced his first signing class on April 13, 2016, and the first team practices were held on Sept. 6, 2016, at the Colorado Springs Sky Sox's Security Service Field. Planning is underway for an on-campus stadium and the team will play home games on Memorial Park's Spurgeon Field.

Thursday's game will be a homecoming for Hajek, where he was a two-time All-American for the Broncos in the 1980s. He is scheduled to participate in pregame activities with Athletic Director Nathan Gibson before the start of the inaugural season.

The Mountain Lions were picked eighth in the RMAC Preseason Poll released on Tuesday, while Cal Poly Pomona was picked to win the South Division of the California Collegiate Athletic Association. Cal Poly won the West Region last season and advanced to the semifinals of the Division II World Series in Cary, N.C., last season.

After Thursday's opener, the teams will continue the series with a doubleheader on Friday at 3 p.m., MST. UCCS will finish the opening weekend on Saturday with NAIA member Hope International in a single game at 11 a.m., MST, at Valencia High School.

Charlie Botnick will call the action of all four games on the UCCS Athletic Network, and each of the games will be carried through the team's Facebook page. Live video is not currently scheduled for games this weekend.