After a nice warm week out in California we returned to Jersey for the rest of our regular season action.  California got a little rough at times, due to a plague on our team that has taken a decent amount of our players out with injuries.  It's almost getting comical now with the injuries taking place; it's like we should be playing all our games under a bubble so it protects us.  Yet, with a few big players out for our squad, many new faces have stepped up and filled their roles.  Everyone knows that through the injuries and anything else that may take place this season, we are all a family and we have to pick one another up.

            Overall, we went 3-3 out in California and now have a 13-4 record on the season.  Cali got a little rough; we hit a 3 game losing streak, but we all knew it would just take time to get out of the funk we were in.  For the time we were losing, nothing at all seemed to go our way.  We finally came out with a big win against our biggest rival out in Cali, Chapman.  Our closer stepped up and pitched a complete game and we walked away with the victory 6-5.  I think that win really turned things around for us and got us back on track.  Everyone rose to the occasion and knew if we wanted to go to the places we want to go this year, we had to walk away with the win. 

            The California trip was filled with many laughs and pranks.  Our rooms were right over the pool lounging area, which was not good for teammates looking to relax by the pool.  One of the days a few of the guys were looking to get some sun by the pool.  Little did they know they were going to get wet, a few of us got the ice buckets and filled them up with water and threw it down at the guys relaxing by the pool.  I'd say it cooled them off a little!  Later in the night, when guys were sleeping, a few of us went around and filled up the garbage buckets with water and put leaners on the door.  It left them with a good surprise when they opened their door for breakfast the next morning. We also had some early risers.  We set up a 5:30 a.m. wakeup call from the front desk, and set their alarm clock for 5:45 a.m., but put the clock underneath their bed. This way they'd just be getting back to sleep when a few minutes later their alarm clock would go off and they'd have to search around to find it.

            This was a fun trip and we took both good and bad things away from our time in Cali.  We all know what we need to do in order for us to succeed this season and all are excited for conference games to start up.  This upcoming week ignites conference play, so the bar has been raised a little more from here on out.  Well the World Baseball Classic is about to come on now, so all of us are going to watch it, GO USA! I'll be back later in the week.  

            Sorry it's been a while since my last blog, but we've been playing games everyday lately so between baseball and school work I've had no time.  Early last week we got snowed in a few days but thank goodness for who ever invented turf.  It took our grounds crew two days to plow the snow off the field and we were back in action.  This was a big week for us because we had several games and knew we had to come prepared to play everyday and match the intensity of our opponents.

             So far for this week, we put together a 4-1 record and a 8-1 overall record; we fell to Albright College earlier on, against a solid pitcher.  It was a good early test for our program on how we would come back after a tough early loss.  We bounced back in fashion.  A little scary for our fans and coaches, down early against The College at Brockport, 5-1, but we came alive late with an 8^th inning six run rally to pull ahead with the victory.  It was a great obstacle to overcome the day after a loss, we could have easily packed our bags and headed to the locker room but the coaches prepared us for games like this and we all know as players it just takes that one big inning.  Baseball is a wacky sport and you have to play all nine innings and anything can happen.

            This season there are going to be many more tough games.  Everyday we step on that field we have a huge target on our backs and other teams rise to the occasion to play us, but we know that, and we love it.  It takes a certain kind of baseball player to play here at Kean, each and everyday you put that uniform on, we play to get to reach our main goal of getting back to Wisconsin, and nothing less. 

            We have one more game this week, on Wednesday, than we head out to California for our rigorous Spring Trip.  Were all looking forward to the nice warm weather out there and the key matchups we have scheduled. Well I'm going to get going, my roommates and I our having a huge MVP Baseball tournament tonight.  A lot of talking has been going on all day about who's going to win, so it should be interesting. There are definitely some bragging rights on the line at this house right now. Loser has to buy tonight at Applebee's Half-Off Special.  So let the tournament get underway and let the champion be crowned....

            I'll be back sometime next week, on my lounge chair outside by the pool in the nice warm weather on the West Coast. 

Over the weekend, it snowed a few inches up here.  Due to the snow, we are now backed up a bit with games.  Doesn't look like we will be playing until possibly this weekend if we're lucky.  Looking back at last week's games, we came away with two victories to improve our record to 4-0.  We played FDU College at Florham and won 5-1, and later in the week had a big regional victory against DeSales, 3-0.

We had a freshman step up on the hill for us against FDU-Florham for his first collegiate start.  We couldn't have asked him to do a better job; he tossed 8 innings allowing only one run.  He is going to have a big role in helping us succeed this season, so it was great to see him go out there and get his first win.  We took the lead right in the beginning of the game, as our bats came alive in the first inning and we tacked on an early five-run lead.  That would be all we needed, as we came away with the 5-1 victory.

Next up, we had DeSales University.  This was a big regional game for us and we knew we had to be up all game.  DeSales is a competitive program and plays almost identical to our style of baseball here at Kean.  On the bump for us was senior pitcher Colin Feneis, he threw very well for us yielding 4 hits in 7 innings of work and not allowing a run.  He was in command throughout the whole course of the game and ended up giving the ball to our closer Brandon Aich, as he closed the door on the Bulldogs for the final two innings.  The two combined for our first shut out of the season, as we walked away with the victory 3-0.  It was a great early win for our team this season.

Over the weekend our coach gave us off to rest up and relax.  It was nice to take two days off in a row.  Due to the snow, it looks like we will be practicing for the next couple of days as our field is covered in snow.  We had a lot of games scheduled this week, so hopefully by the weekend will be back out there playing some baseball.