BROOKINGS — The Brookings Bobcats will set their aim at a spot in the State Tournament as they host Sioux Falls Roosevelt at Bob Shelden Field in an SDHSBA playoff series this weekend.

The best-of-three series is set to begin with a game at 6 p.m. Friday night with the second game scheduled for 1 p.m. Saturday. If a third game is necessary, the two teams will play 30 minutes after the conclusion of Game 2 with a spot in the State Tournament on the line.

The format is a change from the single-elimination format that has been used in previous years to determine the final four teams for the State Tournament, but Brookings head coach Carter Roach and his team are embracing the change and the challenge that comes with it.

“It’s going to be a tough matchup for us,” Roach said. “It’s going to be a couple of good baseball games. They have some great pitchers we have to be ready for and offensively, they’re going to be able to hit the ball, so we’re going to have to execute.”

The matchup between the Roughriders and Bobcats is an interesting one. The two teams were scheduled to play a doubleheader in Brookings on Apr. 16 before it was canceled due to weather and they’ve had an interesting path to the playoffs since the rainout.

The Bobcats have been a streaky team, coming into the series as the No. 7 seed with a record of 13-12. While they won their first four games of the season, they lost six of their next seven before winning six of the next nine games. Although they’ve been up and down, one of the constants has been their offense, which has picked up over the final weeks by averaging 7.1 runs and scoring in double digits in five of the past 10 games heading into this weekend’s series.

“I think our biggest thing has been finding out our identity offensively,” Roach said. “We’re going to cause havoc on the base paths and I would say our approach at the plate has come a long ways from where we started in April.”

The Bobcats have also received some stellar pitching from several arms including starters Nolan Miles and Owen Schneider.

“Nolan’s done a fantastic job for us on the mound and I can’t really think of a start where he didn’t put us in a position to win,” Roach said. “Owen has given us some big-time starts when we’ve needed it coming off a loss and those two guys together have been huge on the mound.”

But a high school baseball tournament is just as much about the depth on the mound as much as the players on it. While Miles and Schneider have sat at the top of the rotation, Roach believes he has several guys to turn to including Austin Clark and David Brink.

“What’s been fun about this team is that we have a lot of guys that can grow,” Roach said. “Being able to set up your bullpen and things like that…I’m proud of our guys for taking the ball and competing at a high level for us.”

With the offense clicking and the pitching staff finding its stride, the Bobcats put together one of its most complete doubleheaders of the year, defeating Mitchell by scores of 14-4 and 13-1 last Saturday.

“I thought Mitchell was a fantastic kind of jumping board for us into the playoffs,” Roach said. “I thought a lot of guys gained a lot of confidence at the plate and we looked really sound defensively.”

The Bobcats will need that momentum against Roosevelt, who has recovered from a shaky start. While the Rough Riders come into the tournament as the 10th seed with a record of 6-13, they’ve won three of their past four games including a sweep over the Kernels on May 7.

Led by former SDSU baseball player and 2011 graduate Erik DeJong, the Rough Riders carry plenty of talent including second baseman and pitcher Jacob Mongar, who had three hits in a 7-5 win over Mitchell and Noah Verdoorn, who allowed one earned run on two hits and three walks with seven strikeouts in the nightcap.

“We haven’t played them and they haven’t played us so it’s going to be two teams that don’t really know too much about each other,” Roach said. “But going in we know that they’re very well-coached. Coach DeJong does a really good job of getting his guys ready to go and they’re going to be talented.”

The winner of this weekend’s series will advance to face the winner of the series between No. 2 Sioux Falls Lincoln and No. 15 Huron at the State Tournament, which will take place on May 24 and 25 at Sioux Falls Stadium.

While the Bobcats would like to make a trip to the State Tournament, they also know they’ll have to beat a talented Rough Rider team to get there.

“This week’s practice has been good and we’re running over every situation you could possibly run into during the playoffs,” Roach said. “We have a big senior class and it means a lot to them to make it to the State Tournament and have success in the postseason, so I’m feeling good about this weekend.”