WEBSTER GROVES – After having its 2020 season cut short after just 13 games due to COVID-19 pandemic, Webster Baseball comes into this season with aspirations once again of walking off Perfect Game Field in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, in early June with the 2021 NCAA Division III Baseball National Championship trophy.
 
That journey towards the national championship begins this weekend as the preseason nationally No. 1/No. 3 ranked Gorloks open its 34th season of intercollegiate baseball by hosting Wartburg College for back-to-back nine inning contests on Saturday, Feb. 27 and Sunday, Feb. 28 at GCS Credit Union Ballpark in Sauget, Ill. First pitch on each day is scheduled for 12 p.m. The two games will mark the first two games of what is expected to be a 40-plus game schedule in 2021 for the Gorloks.
 
**NOTE: Fans will be permitted to attend all Webster Baseball games that are played at GCS Credit Union Ballpark during the 2021 season. All fans will be asked to abide to state and local ordinances regarding COVID-19 and fans in attendance will need to wear a mask and keep socially distance while in the ballpark. In addition, fans will not be allowed to sit anywhere near either of the team dugouts.
 
With the cancellation of the remainder of the 2020 baseball season thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, all of Webster's baseball players were granted an extra season of eligibility by the NCAA and all the players will also get an extra season of eligibility for the 2021 season as this season as the NCAA has said that athletes competing during the 2020-21 school year will not exhaust a season of competition.
 
"We are really fortunate at Webster because of the strength of our master's programs allowed a lot of our guys come back and pursue a master's degree, so these guys that were seniors and at the end of their career last year, a lot of them made the determination to give this thing one more go and come back and pursue their master's degree so it kind of killed two birds with one stone for a lot of our guys," Webster head coach Bill Kurich said. "We return, outside of Joe Swanson, who has moved onto our coaching staff, the bulk of our team this year. I think the guys were hungry, such high expectations at the beginning of last year and not being able to see that through made them want to come back and do it again this year."
 
Kurich, who is entering his 15th season at the helm of the Gorloks in 2021 and since taking over the Webster Baseball program prior to the 2007 season, Kurich has led the program to unprecedented heights and has built what has become one of the premier Division III baseball programs in the country. Since arriving as Webster's coach, Kurich has won 441 games, captured 13 straight SLIAC regular season titles, won 10 SLIAC Tournament championships, earned seven SLIAC Coach of the Year honors, guided Webster to 11 NCAA Tournament appearances,10 30-win seasons and four appearances in the Division III World Series, all of which have come in the last nine seasons.
 
Kurich says that uncertainty of things this season has been a positive for his team during the fall and into preseason practice.
 
"All the uncertainty has been interesting as it allowed us a lot more practice time, a little bit more practice flexibility throughout the fall with the NCAA changing the rules on how often we could practice and when we could practice so it let us spread the fall out a little bit more, but it made for very, very uncertain times, certainly still is as we go through practices heading into our opening weekend," Kurich added. "I feel like in the last two or three weeks we're actually starting to prepare to play a baseball game, where before, we were practicing and competing, but it was hard to get focused on winning a Webster University baseball game."
 
Kurich's 15th Gorlok team will be well-stocked and experienced to make a run at the national championship in 2021 as they return eight position starters, its top three starting pitchers and five of its top six pitchers overall from last season's 8-5 team that opened the year ranked No. 2 in both the Collegiate Baseball Newspaper and D3Baseball.com Preseason polls. In 2019, the Gorloks went 37-13 overall and captured its 13th consecutive regular season St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference title, its 10th SLIAC Tournament championship and also won both the Whitewater Regional and Concordia-Chicago Super Regional en route to advancing to the Division III World Series for the fourth time in school history.

"The expectations are always high, it's the same feeling and I don't want to say this is old hat, but the last six or seven years things have been like that whether you are rated 1, 2, 5 or 10, you know you're going to be a team that is at the top," said Kurich when asked about the high preseason expectations again this season. "Years ago, we were trying to play the teams like us and knock them off and when we beat them, we got excited about beating them, so to be on the other side of that where people are getting excited about beating you is a lot of fun. This is why you play, this is why you work so hard to get to this point. You have to ride the ups and downs and play the long game because it doesn't matter what you're rated at the beginning of the year, it's what your ranked at the end of the year."
 
If the preseason polls are any indication, that national title trophy could be coming home to Webster Groves at the end of the season as Webster opens the 2021 campaign ranked No. 3 in the ABCA/Collegiate Baseball Preseason poll, No. 1 in the Perfect Game Preseason Division III poll and 10th in the D3Baseball.com/NCBWA Preseason poll.
 
"We have an older team as we have a number of 23- and 24-year old guys on the field playing baseball and have a veteran presence that is pretty focused on one goal - winning a national championship. They work awfully hard and we're in a really good spot coming into the season," added Kurich. "Now if you ask me, do I think we're one of the best teams in the country? Yea, I do, 100 percent and I think we prepare that way every day. I don't expect the lofty preseason rankings to affect the way our team plays as the season moves along.
 
"I think anything less than playing in Cedar Rapids and the World Series would be a disappointment for our guys."
 
Among the eight position starters returning for the Gorloks are fourth-year junior All-American third baseman Ben Swords (Freeport, Ill./Freeport), graduate student and former All-American first baseman Kyler Kent (Pottsboro, Texas/Pottsboro), fourth-year junior shortstop Matt Staker (El Cajon, Calif./Saint Augustine), fifth-year senior outfielder/designated hitter A.J. Smith (DuQuoin, Ill./DuQuoin), graduate student outfielder Aron Hopp (Lincoln, Ill./Lincoln College), junior outfielder Adam Lovell (Lafayette, Ind./Saint Joseph's College), second-year freshman outfielder Landon Vahle (Lees Summit, Mo./St. Michael Archangel) and second-year sophomore second baseman/outfielder Mitch Daniels (Columbia, Ill./Columbia). Those eight players combined for 100 hits, 68 runs, 13 extra base hits, 41 stolen bases and hit a combined .291 during the shortened 2020 season.
 
Swords, who was an ABCA/Rawlings Third-Team All-American and a First-Team All-Region and All-SLIAC selection in 2019, finished the 2020 season with a .354 batting average as he had 17 hits, two doubles, one triple, five runs scored, 17 RBI and was 7-for-8 on stolen bases. In addition to Swords, Kent, who was a Third-Team All-American as a sophomore in 2018, hit .208 with 11 hits, two doubles, seven runs scored and 7 RBI and Lovell, who missed most of the 2019 season due to injury, was on pace for an All-SLIAC season in 2020 after leading the Gorloks in hits (19), runs scored (20), doubles (3) and stolen bases (14). His 14 stolen bases were tied for sixth in NCAA Division III in 2020.
 
Kurich says that he expects Kent and Smith to rebound this season from the slow starts they got off to last season.
 
"If you talk about the short sample of guys that struggled at the beginning of last year, Kyler and A.J., did not get off to the start they wanted and they're older, veteran guys that have had great careers and may well end up being Hall of Fame type guys down the road, so you expect a lot of them," said Kurich.

"These kids that have come back for a fifth or sixth year have gone out and gotten almost full time jobs, while they're going to class part-time or getting their master's degree in a different route of academics than they're used to. Their attention gets diverted and you hope they'll get focused and be focused for a full season of baseball. I expect a lot out of those two guys. Kyler and A.J. need to be good for us to be good."
 
Smith, who hit .342 and slugged .497 and scored 40 runs and recorded 53 hits and had 31 RBI as a junior in 2019, hit .304 with 14 hits, seven runs scored, one home run and three RBI during the shortened 2020 season.
 
One of biggest strengths of last year's team was their ability to steal bases as in 13 games, the Gorloks were 47-for-54 on stolen bases and those 47 stolen bases were sixth in NCAA Division III in 2020.
 
Leading the way on the base paths last season was junior outfielder Adam Lovell (Lafayette, Ind./Saint Joseph's College) as he was 14-for-17 in stolen bases and also led the team in hits (19), runs scored (20), RBI (17) and was tied for the team lead in doubles with three. Lovell's 14 steals were ranked sixth in Division III baseball. Along with Lovell, Swords and Vahle each had seven stolen bases, while Smith was 4-for-4 on steals and Hopp and Staker each went 3-for-3 on stolen bases.
 
"Adam is a good player. Adam is the spark at the top of our line-up and when Adam and Aron (Hopp), whether they are hitting either 1 and 2 or 9 and 1 are back-to-back and getting on base, we stole almost 50 bases in 13 games last year," Kurich said. "When you add in Landon (Vahle) and have those three guys hitting in a row, they're as fast as anybody in the country. They are very good base stealers, great defensive players, they're all centerfielders and all play in the outfield. They give us an interesting look in the outfield as it's tough to score and tough to have a ball drop in the outfield when those guys are out there. When Adam, Aron and Landon are all going well, we'll have three in row and that will make us hard to deal with."
 
Much like the past years, defense is expected to be another strong suit for the Gorloks in 2021 as they return all five of their infielder starters and their entire starting outfield from last season.
 
"There are five spots that are really, really high end defensively – our three outfield spots and the left side of our infield. Matt Staker and Ben Swords are as good as there are in the nation," Kurich said about his defense. "Second base is going to be a little bit of a battle. Mitch Daniels settled into a spot there last year and is a really nice offensive player and played well defensively, but we have a couple of other guys are going to help out there – Bo (Slaymaker) and Alek (Elges) are really nice defensive players that can help push Mitch and can push into a spot where we can be flexible and change in the middle of the game and go to a more defensive line-up, if we need be. Bo and Alek can really swing the bat well in their own right. Kyler also does a tremendous job over at first base.
 
"I expect us to a be a very good defensive team," Kurich stressed.
 
While the defense returns primarily in tack from a season ago, Kurich will have to find a new starting catcher this season due to the graduation of Joe Swanson, who was a three-year starter behind the plate and joined the coaching staff during the offseason.
 
Among the top candidates for that starting catching position is sophomore catcher Zach Goodman (Greenwood Village, Colo./Arapahoe), who was Swanson's back-up a season ago.
 
"Zach is going to take over behind the plate for Joe. He will be joined by a couple of other guys that will help our catching corps," the coach added. "Zach is really good behind the plate and is taking over for one of the better catchers that we've ever had in our program with Joe Swanson, so Zach has a lot of big shoes to fill."
 
In addition to Goodman, the other candidates to play some behind the plate this year include second-year sophomore Austin Jisa (Lincoln, Neb./Southeast) and freshmen newcomers Nico Cristelli (Pueblo, Colo./Pueblo East) and R.J. LaRocco (San Diego, Calif./Point Loma).
 
While its hitting and defense are still expected to be strong components for the Gorloks this season, perhaps the strength of this year's team is its pitching as Kurich welcomes back five of its top pitchers from a season ago, including its top three starters and top of its top two arms out of the bullpen from the 2020 campaign.
 
In 2019, the Gorloks finished the season with a team ERA of 2.86, which was the second lowest ERA in the program's history and they also recorded 358 strikeouts and walked just 125 opposing hitters in 416 innings of work. The Gorloks compiled a 3.85 ERA in just a small sample size from last season and had 99 strikeouts and 42 walks in 120.2 innings.
 
"You are going to see a little more depth and some new names in there this year," Kurich said. "I expect our pitching to be really good this year."
 
When talking about Webster's pitching, the first two names that come to mind are All-American and graduate student Matt Mulhearn (Chicago Heights, Ill./Marian Catholic) and fourth-year junior All-Region honoree Sean Beaver (San Diego, Calif./Scripps Ranch). Since the beginning of the 2019 season, those two have combined to make 42 appearances, 35 starts, toss eight complete games, record 216 strikeouts, walk just 41 and post a 21-8 record with a 1.76 ERA.
 
Mulhearn, who was a Third-Team Rawlings/ABCA All-American and an Honorable Mention D3Baseball.com All-American in 2019, finished with a 12-2 record and a 2.13 ERA. On the season, he made 19 appearances and 15 starts and tossed five complete games and one shutout. In 105.2 innings of work, Mulhearn, who was the MVP of the Whitewater NCAA Regional, allowed just 87 hits and 27 runs, while walking 11 and striking out 102. The 102 strikeouts are third most in a season in school history, while the 12 wins and 105.2 innings pitched were both new single season school records. In 2019, he led the team with six appearances and made four starts and tossed the only complete game. In 28 innings, he struck out 23 and walked four batters, while posting an 0-1 record and 1.93 ERA.
 
Beaver, who was a Third-Team All-Central Region selection and a Third-Team All-SLIAC performer in 2019, was just as effective as Mulhearn as he went 8-3 with a 2.30 ERA. On the season, he made 13 appearances, 12 starts and tossed two complete games. In 82.1 innings of work, the right-hander, who was the MVP of the SLIAC Tournament, allowed 71 hits and 28 runs, while walking 21 and fanning 68. In 2019, he made four appearances and four starts and in 20.2 innings, Beaver struck 23 and walked five as he posted a 1-2 record and a microscopic ERA of 0.44.
 
"Matt and Sean have been good pitching 1 and 2 for a couple of years now. They are both competitive guys and they both have figured out how to compete very well," the coach said about Mulhearn and Beaver. "Those two are just strike throwing machines and have good velocity and their off speed stuff is good and are very confident guys that have had the ball in big games for us."
 
The third returning starter from last season is fifth-year senior Cooper Hake (Lincoln, Ill./IU-South Bend), who went 2-0 with a 5.11 ERA in five appearances and four starts in 2020. In 24.2 innings of work, Hake had 15 strikeouts and walked six.
 
"Cooper threw in that three-slot a year ago and had some nice outings and some tough outings, but he'll be right in the mix again this year to give us some quality innings," Kurich said.
 
Two returning pitchers Kurich expects to see take a step forward this season are fourth-year junior Andrew Padilla (Burbank, Ill./Reavis) and second-year freshman Jordan Smevoll (Dyer, Ind./Marian Catholic). Smevoll was named the Pitcher of the Year this past summer in the Midwest Collegiate Summer League.
 
"Andrew is guy who has been in our program for three years and has been knocking on the door of getting really high end innings and I think we'll see that happen this year. He's had a tremendous offseason, gotten himself ready to go and is throwing more strikes than he ever has. His stuff has always been good, and we're excited about him," added Kurich. "Jordan (Smevoll) is a guy that pitched quite a bit as a freshman last year and has the ability to be a dominant, high-end college lefthander."
 
Behind Mulhearn, Beaver, Hake, Padilla and Smevoll are a group of both newcomers that Kurich believes have a chance to help provide depth to the pitching staff.
 
"There's a couple of freshmen that have come in and have really jumped off the page," Kurich said.
 
Those freshmen are J.T. Miller (Centennial, Colo./Regis Jesuit), Alek Elges (Littleton, Colo./Mullen) and Nick Lozano (Trenton, Texas/Trenton).
 
"Alek is a very utility-type of player as he is a switch-hitting infielder and right hander pitcher and he has gotten better and better and is going to pitch a bunch for us. He throws strikes and can throw a breaking ball anytime he wants. J.T. (Miller) is another freshman is a very projectable, tall young man that has good arm strength and has an outstanding slider and is going get quite a bit of opportunity and Nick (Lozano) is from Texas and he reminds me very much of an Adrian Santiago-type of guy that is young, but is going to grow into a really dynamic swing-and-miss type of pitcher," the Webster coach added about his freshmen threesome of pitchers.
 
Along with those three freshmen newcomers, three returning veteran hurlers are also expected to step up this season and those three returners are fourth-year junior Ben Kowalski (Ottawa, Ill./Ottawa Township), second-year sophomore Joey Marko (Winfield, Mo./Winfield) and second-year freshman Alex Foppe (St. Louis, Mo./St. Mary's).
 
"It is Ben Kowalski's turn to be one of the guys. He's been knocking on the door to pitch quality innings. He has a good fastball, a good breaking ball, but he just has to be able to compete," said Kurich. "Joey (Marko) is a guy that has good stuff, but he's just got to be able to compete in those settings and Alex is another one that we expect a lot out of. He has great stuff but has got to grow into that role."
 
Kurich said that defense might be his team's biggest strength and biggest key to success this coming season.
 
"I think we're a really good defensive team. I think if second base works itself out and we're able to turn double plays we'll have a chance to be one of the best defensive teams in the country," Kurich added. "Matt (Staker) and Ben (Swords) are as good as anyone in the country are and are as good as I've ever coached. The guys in the outfield are outstanding and I think if Zach (Goodman) and our catching core are going to give us a chance to throw people out. We hold runners well and we're a hard team to score against."
 
In addition to defense, Kurich says that what his team can do on the bases should be a big plus this season.
 
"The stuff we were able to do on the bases last year was outstanding. We run the bases really well," added Kurich.
 
Perhaps the biggest key for the Gorloks this season is health and staying healthy while still battling the pandemic.
 
"Health and let's just start with that. If we're playing at the end of May and Matt and Sean and our pitching staff is healthy. Because you got to have the front-end guys, your number one's got to go beat another ranked team's No. 1 and if you're not healthy, then that will be more of a challenge," the Webster coach said. "We have a little bit more depth in terms of the position players than we've had in the past, so we can incur some ups-and-downs, and this is going to the kind of season you're going to need it. Who knows what might happen with the testing and you might have guys out a week or two and you're going to have to have other guys step up. The hope is that you're healthy at the end of the season."
 
Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, this season's schedule for the Gorloks will look a lot different than in past years as there will be no spring break trip to Florida, very little travel to play an opponent outside of the area and most of the games will be played on weekends.
 
Webster is scheduled to play between 40-42 games, including 28 games in the St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference. Each conference series in 2021 will feature four games as the teams will play back-to-back doubleheaders either on a Friday-Saturday or Saturday-Sunday format. The first three games of the series will be nine inning games, while the fourth and final game of the series will be seven inning contest.
 
"I think you will see more of a starter-reliever-closer type of set-up type of scenario this year, almost like a big league set-up on the pitching side of things," Kurich said when asked about this year's schedule setup. "Without many midweek games, you don't have to get into a fifth or sixth starter like you've had to in the past."
 
Kurich said playing a four game series in conference play will help him find out about the depth of his pitching staff.
 
"You're going to get to find out the depth of your pitching staff and how it matches up with other people little bit better," the coach said. "If you can get four quality starts and when I say quality starts, I mean four starts where your giving your bullpen the ball tied or a lead of some sort. That is going to be the team that is on top. You have to try and avoid that bad start, that third or fourth starter coming out early in the game, which will set your bullpen back for the whole series."
 
Following this week's two games with Wartburg, the Gorloks will remain home to play three games next weekend as part of the Webster/BSN Sports Classic at GSC Credit Union Ballpark. The Gorloks will face Wartburg on Saturday, March 6 at 10:30 a.m. and will play a doubleheader on Sunday, March 7 beginning at 12 p.m. against Benedictine (Ill.) University. After Webster's game with Wartburg on Saturday, Benedictine will play Wartburg in a 1:30 p.m. game.