CMU baseball progressing from slow start to season
The Central Michigan baseball team is working hard to erase its slow start to the season after recent success.
After a 3-8 start, CMU has gone 6-2 in its last eight games.
“I don’t think there’s any magic thing we have done or need to do to keep going this way,” said head coach Steve Jaksa. “What we are constantly trying to do is get better, and we have done that.”
The Chippewas first snapped a three-game losing streak on March 6 in a dominant 11-1 win against Bethune-Cookman.
The momentum continued for the team as it headed to the Snowbird Class in Port Charlotte, Fla., and won two of the three games.
In the last game in the classic, CMU fell 4-3 to Georgetown after going 15 innings.
The Chippewas came out full force this weekend, going 3-1 against Marshall, even managing a successful comeback in the third game of the series.
Jaksa said much of the start of the season is about identifying roles and figuring out where each person fits to help win games.
To Jaksa and his team, every player is important, and that is a mentality they don’t lose sight of, even when one teammate is having a standout or sub-par performance.
“Different guys show great leadership on any particular day,” Jaksa said. “I’m not going to call out players because that’s something I’ve never done, but, yes, we’ve had some guys play really well for us and also struggle on days. I just want everyone to continue to get better. Everybody complements each other to help achieve the goal to win ball games.”
Sophomore right-handed pitcher Jordan Foley has gotten off to a promising start, playing a crucial role in many of CMU’s victories.
Foley is 4-0 this season and pitched his first career complete game in a 4-1 win against West Virginia for the first game of the Snowbird Classic.
Freshman Logan Regnier and his brother, sophomore Nick Regnier, have teamed up at the plate for the Chippewas, leading the team with the top two batting averages.
Nick holds the No. 1 spot with a .333 average, recording 27 hits in 81 at-bats with five doubles, a triple and three home runs.
The elder Regnier has also racked up 16 RBI.
Logan falls just behind his brother, with a .329 average, 23 hits in 70 at-bats, five doubles, three triples and 11 RBI.
While the team is heading in the right direction, Jaksa said they aren’t done progressing.
“This group is hungry,” Jaksa said. “We’re not a finished product yet. We want to see the same kind of improvement in next few weeks, and we hope the record will improve along with it.”
