No. 23 Kats pleased after opening practice
1/27/2017 6:44:00 PM | Baseball
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HUNTSVILLE – Sam Houston State baseball opened practice on Friday afternoon capped by a six-inning scrimmage to begin a spring that will feature another formidable schedule at Don Sanders Stadium.
A key difference from last year, is the wealth of familiar faces. The Bearkats, who garnered their first preseason top-25 ranking at No. 23, return 18 letterwinners and eight positional starters from a team that advanced to the NCAA Regionals a season ago.
“Everyone is on the same page,” third-year head coach Matt Deggs said. “We go out and can communicate without talking. That is always my end game, especially player to coach. We get that synergy going where we know what we're thinking without having to say it.”
Catcher Hunter Southerland is one of three players – alongside left-handed pitchers Seth Ballew and Riley Cooper – who redshirted a season ago and anxiously await their first in-game opportunities at Sam Houston.
“It was great being back out there today,” Southerland said. “This is one of the best days of the year. It was nice after sitting out last year to come in and get things going. My mindset last year was to get better any way I could. I wanted to mentally get better watching pitchers or do anything to help the team win.”
One area the Bearkats look to re-tool is a bullpen that lost four players to graduation from a year ago. Friday served as the starting point to filling those vacancies with new talent.
“I think the story of the day is the job Gabriel Sequeira did coming out of the bullpen,” Deggs said. “He got an opportunity and gave up one that was a needless run on an error but other than that he pounded the zone with three pitches and did a great job. It's a good starting point but we have a long way to go.”
Right-handed freshman Nick Mikolajchak, a Klein Collins High School product, also got his first taste at Division I baseball, facing his offensive counterparts that ranked 30th nationally and first in the Southland Conference for hits a season ago.
“It was great to get back out and compete after a long break,” Mikolajchak said. “It's great to throw against a real hitter instead of the dummies in the bullpen. Being a freshman it can be a little overwhelming but you just have to come out with the mentality that whatever the other team has you're coming to take it.”
On top of the newcomers, Friday night starter Heath Donica threw his first session of the spring. The senior who was named 2016 Southland Conference Tournament MVP, anchors a staff that welcomes back D1Baseball Freshman All-America Riley Gossett and Dakota Mills.
“We pitched the ball really well,” Deggs said of the opening practice. “Heath Donica set a great tone. Any time you have a guy like that and Mikolajchak on the back end who will pound sinkers, it is going to be an issue.”
The Bearkats return Saturday afternoon for the second of 17 practices leading up to Opening Day on Friday, Feb. 17 at Don Sanders Stadium. Sam Houston will face Nevada, who received votes in the College Baseball newspaper poll, on opening weekend, before hosting No. 17 Texas and No. 13 Louisiana.
“Last year, this day was one of my first day's here so it was a brand new experience,” Southerland said. “We were pretty young last year and we had some freshmen that really stepped up. This year, everyone is back and we have a savvy group of veterans.”
