Jennifer Hoffer – Sports Editor
After coming off a 20-21-1 season, Rocco Cundari said he is looking forward to how the baseball team bounces back from last year.
“Just like as a pitcher does, it’s always how you bounce back from your last start,” Cundari said. “As a team I’d love to see the way we go about our year. I think we have a better team than last year, chemistry wise. So I think that will be fun to be on that ride with them.”
Chemistry, is something that’s important and something that the team didn’t have last year, Cundair said. But he said that they also have a younger team
“The upperclassman have to rely on the underclassman and the underclassman have to look up to us,” Cundari said. “So we’ve been working well together.”
Cundari said he and the team have the same mentality every year and every game; and that’s more wins, but there does need to be improvement.
“We just need to score runs that’s really all it is,” Cundari said. “Last year we put guys on but we really didn’t score. And that’s harder on our pitching because we have a good staff. If we get more runs we’ll get more wins.”
The team has two new transfer students Kyle Holland and Julian Sobin.
Cundari said Kyle will be a good defensive catcher for them this season.
“He’s actually just an all-around good player,” Cundari said. “He’s going to pitch for us too and play the outfield. So he’s a huge utility add to our team. He’s got a good arm, so he’ll probably start in the outfield this year. It’s always nice to cover every corner with good players.”
As for Julian, Cundari said that he’s great defensively at first and has a big stick at the plate.
“They both embody a lot of good skills,” Cundari said. “We’re solid with those two transfers coming in they’re both much needed help for sure.
Both Cundari, and Matt Burns said they are looking forward to playing UTampa this season. Burns said he never likes to get too ahead of himself but the UTampa game will be exciting and will be an opportunity for the team to make a statement.
Cundari said that he always looks forward to the conference games but the out of conference game against UTampa is on the list of games because they are a nationally ranked team.
“Other than that I’m really looking forward to facing off against Franklin Pierce again,” Cundari said. “They embarrassed us last year. So I’d love to get a start versus them and see what we can do.”
Pitcher, Cole Bryant just came off injury this past summer, which set him back behind all the other players.
Cundari said because of this, he thinks Bryant is going to have a breakout year.
“I’m looking forward to seeing him,” Cundari said. “He’s throwing good pens. He had a good live the other day. Cole is going to be a great asset to the team this year and I’m really looking forward to watching him play this year.”
As for Cundari himself, he said he has the same mentality every year going into the season.
“I just need to keep the ball down, get ground balls and strikeouts,” Cundari said. “If I could admit the walks, I’ll most likely get the win. So I would say limiting my walks. It’s going to start with our starting pitchers, and ending with the closers to get the wins this season.”
