What to expect in the upcoming season
The Terrier baseball team has just begun its season with a three game home series against Ohio University Bobcats that wrapped up yesterday. The games occurred after the writing of this article – results and stats can be found at woffordterriers.com. The Terriers are coming off a 36-23 season, 24-8 at home and 15-9 in conference, finishing third in the SoCon. The Terriers did so with Adam Scott leading the rotation with a 3.14 ERA, holding batters he faced to just a .237 batting average. Scott is gone, drafted in the fourth round by the Indians, and five other key pieces of the lineup have also graduated.
Coach Todd Interdonato is confident with what he has this year despite all of this. He spoke very highly of senior southpaw Austin Higgenbotham who went 6-5 with a 4.50 ERA last year. He also logged 102 innings and a 119 strikeouts. “I think it will be a very natural transition for him as we go through the season,” Interdonato said. “Our pitching staff last year was very successful because we had a guy like Adam up front, kind of leading the charge. I feel this year our depth is a lot better than it has been in the past. I think our bullpen will be an area of strength, I think we’re deeper with a lot more weapons, but maybe not necessarily the catastrophic one up at the front.”
Interdonato also spoke very highly of three transfer players; outfielders Hudson Byorick and Mike Brown, as well as infielder Josh Congdon. Interdonato said “They give us more options, and last year we went to the tournament with like 25 or 26 healthy bodies, and usually you go there with 35. Those guys and the bullpen provide us with really good options. The longer those guys are here, the more comfortable they are, and you really start to see their true talent starting to come out. Josh has played really well this prespring, much better than he played in the fall, and I think it’s all rooted in being comfortable.”
The team also has a relatively large cache of freshmen developing and a solid core of returning players, including infielders Brett Rodriguez, who hit .274 and stole 30 bases last year, and Andrew Orzel, who hit .270 and drove in 35 RBIs.
The Terriers play against UNC Asheville Feb 20, but the game Coach Interdonato is most excited for on the schedule is Virginia Commonwealth University on Feb 23. “We play them one time on a Saturday… so it’s easy to breeze over that, this one game in the middle of a tournament, but they’re a very traditional top fifty team, really good, really well balanced, so I think that I’m looking forward to that one because I think it will be a really good barometer for us.”
