The Riverhawks fall baseball team kicked off its 17-game exhibition season on Sept. 3 with a double-header against Chesapeake College.

Head baseball coach Nick Hoffner said one of the squad’s strengths is its returning pitchers. 

“Pitching is extremely important in the game of baseball,” Hoffner said. “We have a lot of guys that are returning, that gained a lot of valuable experience last year as freshmen so we’re looking for those guys to take that experience and build on it.”

In the fall, the Riverhawks play preseason games–known as “fall ball”—to prepare for the upcoming spring season.

This past spring season the Riverhawks won 10 of 48 games. Infielder and pitcher Andrew Leginze led the team with a .299 batting average and 43 hits in the 2022 spring campaign. Outfielder Nicholas Toskov led the team with 22 stolen bases and a .447 on-base percentage. 

Hoffner said his goal for the fall season is to improve and stay healthy for spring ball. 

“Our goal is just get guys better, get guys stronger, keep guys healthy,” Hoffner said. “We want to improve. … We want to be better … working toward just getting better every day.” 

Hoffner said he wants “to see how some of the returners have improved over the course of the summer from last spring. And then obviously, we want to try to get a good look at a lot of our incoming freshmen.”

Returning outfielder Eric Hall said he feels good about the fall season.

“So pitching, [batting and] fielding [are] all going good,” Hall, a second-year kinesiology student, said.  “When we started the first day [of practice] I could see a lot of potential.”

Catcher Sam D’Amelio said he feels optimistic about the talent the players bring to the squad.

“There just seems to be a different energy and vibe with the team this year,” D’Amelio, a first-year undecided student, said. “And I think we’re ready to win some games.”

Pitcher William D’Antoni said fall ball is a different feeling from the spring season.

In the fall, “you have a lot more practice time to work and develop [skills],” D’Antoni, a second-year kinesiology student, noted. “In the spring, it’s all this competition [and] it’s competing every day.”