Cardinal Huskies’ baseball coach Dan Wolf is keeping an open mind on what to expect for this season. One thing for sure is that the Huskies will not be lacking experience as they prepare for the 2024 season.
“The kids are working hard,” said the first-year coach. “It is a new adventure. We have some strong pitching and have a lot of starters returning from last year’s season. We have some good numbers with 18 kids.”
It will be Wolf’s first season as Cardinal’s head coach, taking over for former Coach Greg Bean, and comes to Cardinal after spending six years leading Fairport Harding. He inherits a Huskies’ squad consisting of four seniors and eight juniors.
“It is very important because you do not have to spend so much time going over the little stuff and they already know and have experience on defense or pick-offs,” he added. “It’s nice to have the experience.”
Of Cardinal’s four returning seniors, three of them will comprise the pitching rotation and two of them received valuable experience last year behind former standout Jake Bean, who is now pitching at Kent State University.
Cardinal’s three senior pitchers are right-handers Troy Domen, Jack Puruczky and Logan Strever. Of the three, Domen and Strever received the most playing time on the mound and are expected to be the Huskies’ top two pitchers this season with Puruscky as the third option.
“Logan is responsible. He is a leader also and he was a quarterback,” said Wolf. “Troy is very pure. He is very gifted. He is a smooth fielder and he has a strong arm and swings a nice bat.”
In addition to having a trio of senior pitchers to lead the rotation, Cardinal will have a deep pool of pitchers to draw from by having ten players vying for time on the mound.
“I think we are very strong,” Wolf said. “That is one of our strengths of the team, our overall pitching. Not just the seniors but all of our pitching is pretty solid.”
It’s the deepest group of pitchers Wolf has had at his disposal in a long time as his previous team, Fairport Harding, lacked pitching depth throughout most of his time there. He acknowledged how difficult it is for an Ohio High School Athletic Association Division III or Division IV school to have a deep pitching rotation but somehow the Huskies have found a way to buck that trend.
In addition to the pitching, Wolf said that the Huskies will also be strong defensively in the infield by relying on Puruscky or junior Austin Jones at first base, Puruscky will also share playing time behind the dish with junior Hunter Gresch, junior Matt Hissa at second base and junior Carter Tucker anchoring third base.Wolf added that the Huskies’ line-ups will be dominated by the upperclassmen this season and it will be difficult for the underclassmen to find playing time but he is appreciative that while he has several reliable seniors, he still will return most of his squad for next year.
“It is nice to have the depth this year and it is also nice to see a lot of the kids returning because whatever we accomplish here we will build on that next year,” he said.
When Wolf first took over at Fairport Harding, the school still belonged to the Chagrin Valley Conference but soon left the CVC to join the Northeastern Athletic Conference Stripes Division. It has been awhile since Wolf coached in the CVC but the conference is even deeper than he remembers.
“It will be extremely competitive,” he noted. “Every team is solid as far as I know. Some teams I am not familiar with. I know Kirtland is always strong, Wickliffe has a good program and I have played against them before, but I have never seen Crestwood play before. Some of our teams on our schedule I know nothing about.”
The Huskies tied with Berkshire for second place in the CVC Valley Division last season with Kirtland taking the league championship, but Wolf is confident that the Huskies’ wealth of experience could give them a leg-up in chasing the league championship.
Although Wolf is optimistic about Cardinal’s defense, he said a lot will hinge on how well Cardinal can swing the bat this year. He’s been encouraged by what he has seen in practice but the proof will come when they compete against live competition.
Cardinal’s season got off to a rough start when it was was shut out by Manchester 9-0 in the home opener on Monday.
Following a home game against LaBrae on Wednesday and a road game against the Vikings on Thursday, the Huskies will return to action when they host CVC foe Harvey in a crossover game at Paul Verno Field in Middlefield on Monday at 5 p.m.
