Issue date: 3/4/08 Section:  Link

The IUP baseball team began its season the way every team hopes: by winning. They did so by completing a four-game sweep of Virginia State last weekend (photos). It was the first outdoor action the team has seen since the fall.

After relentless indoor training during the off season, Coach Jeff Ditch was pleased with how his team performed in their first opportunity to play outside.

"I think anytime that you spend so much time indoors with practice, the chance to get out on any field to play is a huge bonus," he said, "and we're excited about that and to come back with four wins. You couldn't ask for a better start."

The Crimson Hawks responded to their first chance at the outdoors with a 27 run-30 hit attack against Virginia State. Ditch said this was a huge boost to his team coming out of the gates.

"It's such a confidence-builder for our guys because in the batting cages, we are competing our hitters against our pitchers," he said, "yet they are competing against each other, so this was a great opportunity to get outside and see other competition and evaluate."

The team has a solid mix of upper and underclassmen, but if they are to be successful, Ditch said they must look at their captains to lead them.

Seniors Shayne Busti, Matt Duda, Dan Snyder and junior Ryan Mostyn were voted captains by their teammates in the fall.

"Those guys are all veterans and good players and who I would target in on for leadership. I feel they are very deserving [of being voted in]," Ditch said.

The off-season around Indiana meant lots of preparation indoors. Other than scrimmaging itself outside for the first five weeks of the fall semester, the team was training indoors. The players spent countless amounts of time working on their hitting, pitching, weightlifting and conditioning. These are what Ditch calls his "phases of preparation," leading up to the final and current phase: the season.

As far as his goals for the team this season go, Ditch is focusing more on making the playoffs and winning close games.

"Our goal every year is to make the PSAC playoffs," he said.  "My first year [here] we won 10 games, last year we won 20, so a magical number would be to get to 30 wins. There are a lot of one-run games, and a lot of those determine how many games you win."

In his third year, Ditch has brought continued success as well as coveted recruits to IUP. He feels that the campus and facilities help him to recruit and sometimes even do the recruiting for him.

"IUP is an easy place to recruit and be successful because there are so many positive opportunities for student-athletes. The facilities, academics and the campus help make an easy recruiting tool."