Nick Torres (10) anchors the Cal Poly lineup looking for redemption at the site of last year’s regional. By Owen Main

In a season where they’ll play 50-plus games, the Cal Poly baseball team has played only played four so far. After last year’s regional, the three-game series against defending national champion UCLA that starts tonight.

The game is getting lots of national attention from college baseball writers.

Aaron Fitt of Baseball America is “bullish on the Mustangs” and talked extensively about their upside in last week’s Baseball America podcast. Baseball America pushed Cal Poly to number 22 in their poll this week as well.

Kendall Rodgers of Perfect Game USA also like what the Mustangs have done so far.

PG TOP 25: Latest rankings out: @UVABaseball remains atop, @calpoly_stangs @UKBaseball enter: http://t.co/B8YQVmUo1g #CollegeBaseball

— Kendall Rogers (@KendallRogersPG) February 17, 2014

Shotgun Spratling of CollegeBaseballDaily.com had a nice preview this morning of this weekend’s series.

Was #CalPoly better than #UCLA last year? The Mustangs think so. — SoCal #CollegeBaseball Weekend Preview: http://t.co/GECLYUFSWA

— Shotgun Spratling (@SoCal_CBDaily) February 21, 2014

Rightfully so, Spratling points to the play and comments of Nick Torres and Matt Imhof as a rich backdrop to the three games in Jackie Robinson Stadium — the site of the ball Torres lost in the lights last year.

Prior to LAST season, Larry Lee talked to me about how difficult it was to schedule games or even get call-backs from teams on the East Coast, making any series against a Pac-12 Conference school an important one in terms of national profile and even (possibly) future scheduling.

With the Regional appearance last year, the Mustangs are more on the national radar. But Cal Poly definitely still has something to prove. Writers have been building them up and making them a worthwhile topic. Winning two or three games in Westwood would allow the writers to continue the narrative of Cal Poly as a team on the rise. Losing two or three games wouldn’t kill that narrative completely, but it definitely would quiet it for a while.

Like I said, we are only four games into the season, but I think it’s fair to say a lot is riding on the series for the Mustangs. What are your predictions for tonight’s game and for the series?