The Webster University baseball team, the SLIAC coaches' choice to win the West Division in 2017, starts the 2017 season with three single games this weekend in Memphis, on February 24-26.
Webster has won the SLIAC regular season title 10 straight years and has won the SLIAC tournament championship eight of the last 11 years it has been completed. The Gorloks, was 10-2 in the West Division and 18-4 overall in the SLIAC in 2016. The Gorloks were 28-15 overall last season and return 21 players, including six field players who started 24 or more games.
The Webster offense returns Kyle Uhrich (SR, St. Louis, MO/Webster Groves HS). Uhrich batted .329 with 11 home runs and 47 RBIs, and in two seasons is already Webster's all-time HR leader with 28 and is sixth in RBIs. Uhrich was a d3baseball Third Team All-American and First Team Central Region, and was an ABCA Second Team Central Region pick in 2016.
Also returning is Mike Wick (JR, Bartlett, IL/Bartlett) who batted a team-leading .377 and scored a team-high 36 runs, while swiping 14 bases. Matt Wollnik (SR, Naperville, IL/Nequa Valley), who will patrol shortstop for his fourth straight season, returns also after batting .297 in 2016.  Fourteen newcomers, including nine freshmen, will be counted on to fill any holes made by graduation.
Josh Fleming (JR, Columbia, IL/Columbia), 4-1, 2.88 ERA, 50K/34.1 inn, Matt Goro (SR, Wildwood, MO/Lafayette), 2-0, 0.96 ERA, C.J. Lee (JR, Aurora, IL/Waubonsie Valley), who missed 2016 due to injury, and Johnny Lord (SR, Naperville, IL/Nequa Valley), 5-2, 3.59 ERA, will be the core starting staff. Fleming had a strikeout ratio of 13.1 batters per nine innings.
Ulrich, who pitched just one inning of work in 2016, will be counted on to do the closing. Ulrich, who nursed an arm injury over the past year, threw 9.2 innings in 2015, striking out 17 while giving up just two hits and walking four in six appearances.
Top newcomers include outfielder Dakota DeFreitas (JR, Brechin, Ontario), infielder Nate Tholl (SO, Tinley Ridge/IL), and OF/INF Conner Wardlaw (JR, Arnold, MO). DeFreitas, believed to be the Gorloks' first Canadian born player, transferred from John Wood CC (IL), Tholl from John A Logan CC (IL), and Wardlaw from Jefferson College in Hillsboro, MO.
Webster will face host Rhodes College on February 24, Mary Hardin-Baylor (TX) on February 25 in Millington, TN, and Millsaps College (MS) on February 26 back at Rhodes.
