The Puget Sound baseball team is coming off a great year. In their previous season the team went 12-12 in conference play and 19-21 in the whole season, many of the returners earned honors. Sophomore Matt Robinson (Lafayette, Calif.) earned second team honors as a freshman pitcher and Senior Dakota Resnik (Bellevue, Wash.), and juniors Casey Coberly (Boise, Id.), Matt Cox (Salem, Ore.), and Will Mentor (Seattle, Wash.) all earned Northwest Conference honorable mention last season.
Senior Kainoa Correa (Hilo, Hawaii) is planning on making his last season a memorable one. He looks toward new strategies for increasing their record from last year. Correa said, “With the change in bat regulations from BESR to BBCOR the style of play is going to change drastically in NCAA baseball. The focus is now on small-ball offense, good pitching, and consistent defense. This year’s squad has the talent, depth, and consistency to succeed in this new style of play and improve our record from last year.”
Resnik agrees with his fellow senior on the defensive aspect of this year’s season. He said, “We have a solid group of veteran pitchers this year and if we play good defense we should easily improve on our .500 record from last year.”
Both Correa and Resnik are in their last year at Puget Sound. To many student athletes, the final season is often the most important and most memorable.
On his senior season Correa said, “I think we have a great class of senior leadership this year. All five of us have been involved in the program a long time, and we all have a firm grasp on what we need to do to in order for us to have a successful senior season.”
When asked who he’s looking forward to playing most, Resnik said “It’s not even close. I can’t wait to play PLU because not only are they our rivals, but they cut me my freshmen year and I have killed them every season since.”
Correa agrees with Resnik, remarking “We are definitely looking forward to play PLU. They are cross-town rivals and we have had a heated rivalry with them during our time here. We are also looking forward to playing George Fox and Linfield. They are consistently at the top of the NWC, and for us to establish ourselves in that class we need to prove ourselves against the top tier of talent in our league.”
The Loggers begin their season February 12 against St. Martins.