The Baseball team thought it was just an average practice until they heard the news about their Head Coach Scott Davis. Senior Third Baseman Nathan Arst remembers this moment “The coaches sat us down and told us about what happened to Coach Davis. Baseball and wins and losses, and everything else aside, just from a people’s perspective, like hearing that happened was shocking,” Arst said. Davis was injured in a barn accident while working for a company called Barn Again, a company who helps take down a barn for free in exchange to salvage all the wood. One moment he was helping take down that barn and the next the barn was collapsing on him. 7-year Assistant Coach, Jeff Rogers replaced Davis as the interim head coach. Rogers has been trying to keep as much of the program the same as possible.
“There was a lot of things we kept the same. I wanted to keep everything the same from when Coach Davis was in charge,” Rogers said. Although a lot has been the same amongst Rogers and Davis, a unique characteristic about Davis was his passion.
“He is very passionate. He cares a great deal. And he’s a great communicator of those kinds of things,” Rogers said. Despite this initial obstacle in the team’s season, they’ve been doing better, recently picking up a 3-2 win over rivals Parkway West. One thing that they’ve been doing is being more aggressive at the plate. Junior First Baseman Jared Chorlins is currently leading the team in RBIs and Home Runs and attributes it to his hitting style.
“I’m being aggressive early, finding my pitch and just hitting it hard and trying my best to put the ball in play,” Chorlins said. The team also has a high sense of drive which can be attributed to the 17 Seniors on the team, 14 more than last year.
“Every game, we’re playing our hearts out, because it could be the last possible game ever for a lot of the seniors who aren’t playing baseball in college,” Arst said. “So our motivation, our drive is extremely high.”
Despite the team adjusting to a new head coach, they are sure not to forget Davis.
“We wear a play for Davis t-shirt before every home game to warm up in. It’s just a reminder that he’s a big part of the program and he’s certainly a very integral part of everything that we do,” Arst said. Overall, the main driving factor behind the teams play this year is inspired by Scott Davis.
“We worry about him, but we play with a purpose, play for him, because we know he wants to coach us because that’s what he loves to do,” Chorlins said.
