The Hillsdale College baseball team will resume its season this weekend with three games against Lee University in Cleveland, Tennessee, coming off of the 2023 G-MAC Preseason Coaches Poll prediction to finish fourth in the North Division 

“I was really fortunate that I have almost my entire starting lineup coming back from last year,” Head Coach Tom Vessella said. “We’re very upperclassmen heavy. These guys have had a lot of playing time over the last couple of years, so we’re really excited for the type of kids that we have and the experience they have going into the season.”

After finishing seventh place in last season’s G-MAC competition, the team is excited to capitalize on its returning starting lineup, rotation, and consistent hitting while still targeting improvement in the areas of defensive consistency and closing out games well. 

“If the defense doesn’t play well, then it doesn’t matter what the pitcher is doing because you’re just throwing away their effort,” senior shortstop Aidan Brewer said. “It doesn’t matter what the offense does if you can’t pitch and play defense because you just want to score enough runs to win.”

The team will kick off the season with a doubleheader on Friday and a final game on Saturday. The Chargers have 3-4 conference games scheduled each week through the first week of May.  

“We are all itching for competition,” senior outfielder Lewis Beals said. “Over the fall we had some scrimmages against junior colleges and some other smaller schools. But since October, we’ve been just practicing amongst ourselves as a team doing inter squad competitions. Every last one of us is ready for it. We’re ready to hit the field running.”

Navigating Michigan winters, the team practices indoors in the winter, focusing on defensive work, hitting, and lifting.

“Generally, outfielders and catchers do practice together and infielders will practice together with about nine or 10 guys in each group,” Brewer said. “I enjoy it. There’s nothing I’d rather do than play baseball. So we actually get to practice and play baseball every day.”

The team anticipates surprising people with a more solidified coaching staff going into their second year with the team. 

“I think we’re gonna play really well this year,” Beals said. “We have a lot of seniority, a lot of senior leadership, and a lot of talent, frankly, that we’re just hoping to display and have things come together. I really do think they will. Everything has kind of worked itself out for us to play really well this year. We’ll have a breakout season.”