John Pawlowski had a plan to tinker with his starting rotation this weekend against Miami (Ohio).

Unforeseen circumstances, though, have the Auburn baseball coach looking for another time to start whittling down his group of five to three weekend starters before the conference opener against Georgia.

Wednesday’s doubleheader in frigid temperatures coupled with a family emergency for junior-college transfer Cole Nelson has forced Pawlowski to stick to the same rotation he has for the first two weekends. Jon Luke Jacobs will start in tonight’s 6 p.m. game at Plainsman Park, Grant Dayton will go Saturday and Nelson, if he’s able to make it back from Minnesota in time, will start the series finale Sunday.

“We can’t do an awful lot with it this weekend like we planned,” Pawlowski said. “Those things happen, things come up. We’ll just have to work through it.”

Nelson certainly has solidified his place in the rotation. Now it’s just a matter of what day he’ll be pitching when conference play starts March 19.

Nelson is 2-0 with a 0.73 ERA and 15 strikeouts over 12 1/3 innings. He’ll likely be back for Sunday’s start, but Pawlowski hasn’t ruled out the possibility of him remaining at home to stay with his father, who came down with a severe illness but has shown signs of recovery, Pawlowski said.

Jacobs and Dayton, both of whom were Auburn’s regular Friday-Saturday pitchers last year, have had their fair share of struggles to start 2010 and neither has done much to bolster his job security.

Neither pitcher has been able to crack five innings in their four combined starts. Jacobs, who is 0-1 with a 6.00 ERA, has had trouble with his control (eight walks) and Dayton (0-1, 7.00) has had trouble preventing the big hit, surrendering four doubles and three home runs.

“Jon Luke Jacobs and Grant Dayton are fighting for their opportunities,” Pawlowski said.

Nipping at their heels are Dexter Price and Cory Luckie, who both pitched fairly well in Wednesday’s doubleheader sweep of Davidson.

Price went 5 2/3 innings and allowed four earned runs, but still pitched well enough to pick up the victory. Luckie, despite going just 4 1/3 innings, was dazzling, striking out nine batters and allowing just one run.

The cold weather and Luckie’s previous arm injury, which kept him off the field all last season, had him on a pitch count Wednesday, but the redshirt sophomore will be able to throw 90-100 pitches in his next start, Pawlowski said.

Luckie’s arm was “feeling great” Thursday, Pawlowski said, and he could be one or two more impressive starts away from working his way back into the weekend rotation.

“He’s certainly a candidate, and we would have to maneuver him around to get him on a weekend if we want to do that,” Pawlowski said. “We’ve got a few more games to figure it out before Georgia.”

| 737-2561