The Falcon baseball team will kick off their new season on Friday, Saturday and Sunday afternoon against the University of Alabama-Birmingham Blazers, as the team looks to improve from their 15-34 overall record last season.
“We want to get off to a good start,” Falcons head coach Danny Schmitz said. “It just seems like every year the past few years we’ve gotten off to slow starts and we’re always trying to play catch-up, but I really like the way the guys are working this year. They’re working extremely hard.”
The team is looking forward to playing at Alabama-Birmingham because of the warmer weather conditions and the ability to play outside on a regulation field.
“Any time you play against a southern school, you know they’ve been outside and seen a baseball field,” Schmitz said. “We have not, but that’s just the life of a northern school. We’re fortunate to have the indoor facility that we have here, and we try to simulate every aspect of the game that we can in here, but we still need to get outside and actually get on a baseball field.”
With inclement weather forcing the team to hold most of its practices inside at the Perry Field House, the team has had little opportunity to get practice outside.
“With playing outside, we’ve had about a half of a practice,” Schmitz said. “We went out for our first official day of practice out on the football field for about an hour, and we’ve been out in the parking lot a couple times to catch pop ups and fly balls. But that’s about it, so it’s been a while.”
The team is also looking forward to seeing their players in action this season, some of whom will get playing time in the Alabama-Birmingham series.
“We have a lot of new faces this year,” Schmitz said. “We probably have 12 first-year guys between freshmen and junior college transfers, so that’s going to take some time to figure out all the pieces of the puzzle… They’re a very talented group of young players. They’re going to get opportunities; I don’t know exactly when, but they need to be ready and they’ve been working their tails off. They’re not in awe, not intimidated at all. They’re just going about their business and doing a great job.”
One of those freshman players is infielder/outfielder Adam Furnas, who grew up in Bowling Green and played at Bowling Green High School.
“Living in BG your entire life, you become a Falcon fan by heart,” Furnas said. “So it’s just awesome to be able to suit up in Falcon gear right now and be able to play for them.”
Furnas also said that the team is ready for the challenge against Alabama-Birmingham.
“I think we’re ready as a team, and I feel like I’m ready as well individually,” Furnas said. “Obviously going down to Alabama’s a huge deal for us. They’re a good program and a good team, so it’s going to be a really nice task for us at the beginning of the year.”
