The snow has finally relinquished its control of the grass, the temperature has risen above freezing, and thoughts of summer vacation overshadow thoughts of finals.
All of this can only mean one thing, baseball season is getting underway.
Except at UNH.
The UNH Baseball Club was supposed to start their spring season on March 31 against St. Joseph's College. But due to the team's home field at St. Thomas Aquinas High School being flooded, the baseball team has been forced to postpone their home opener until April 2l against SUNY Albany.
That's right, you read correctly; the team's home field is at a high school in Dover. Not on campus, but at a high school 15 minutes away.
But this kind of inconvenience is nothing new for the club, which has been receiving the short end of the stick for the past seven years of its existence after it was cut by the athletic program in 1997 due to Title IX restrictions.
"Lack of practicing is obviously a big problem," said Coach Peter Michel, who has been the head coach of the team since its founding in 2000.
The club only practices two days a week, three if they are lucky, which is definitely not enough time to hone all of a baseball player's skills. And team tri-captain Steve Wheeler couldn't agree more.
"We only hit three times a week," he said. "In order to get better, we need to hit everyday."
Unfortunately, being unable to practice and hit everyday is simply a wish when you don't have a field to call your own and you are sharing a basketball court with the softball team or a turf field with the soccer team.
"It's difficult when you don't a have a home field," said Coach Michel. "We are guest where ever we play, even when we are the home team."
To make matters worse, the inability to actually play baseball is just part of the club's problems. Because as Coach Michel puts it, you have to evaluate the team from two different angles. First from the baseball side and then from the club side. And when evaluating a club, one word separates a successful club from a failing one, fundraising.
Clubs receive little to no financial support from the university, so if they want to be successful, they have to raise the necessary funds themselves and the baseball club is no exception. Hosting baseball clinics, annual golf scrambles, and team dinners are just some of the ways the team is raising the money they need to not only succeed as a club, but also show the university they have the support of the community. Community support would in turn mean more money from the university.
It appears that the UNH Baseball Club has a Catch 22 on their hands, and they are fully aware of it.
"We have to get more money to be given more money," said Wheeler.
Luckily for the Wildcats, all their hard work is finally paying off.
"This is our best year of fundraising ever," said fellow tri-captain Lincoln Lynch.
Coach Michel concurs.
"This is the best group of fundraisers that I have had in six years."
But all this work is far from easy. "It's hard getting the whole team together to help, mostly because of different schedules," said Lynch.
Despite all these troubles, this group of guys can still hold their own on the field. They were league champions three out of the five years they were members of the NECBA (New England Club Baseball Association) where they played against the likes of Northeastern and Maine. And last year the team finished in second place in the YSCC (Yankee Small College Conference), which is the league the team plays in during its fall season.
"We will be competitive this year, we have the pitching," said Coach Michel. The pitching as well as defense is expected to be the team's strengths, while hitting will be the weak spot because of the lack of opportunities to practice.
And in an attempt to show off their skills on a more national stage, the UNH Baseball team has joined the NCBA (National Club Baseball Association), which is a young, but quickly growing national college club league. It will serve as the teams new spring league. "The NCBA is a legitimate league and will hopefully make the team look more legitimate," said Lynch.
Hopefully this new league and the extra fundraising these guys have been doing will be the necessary push the club needs to get the attention of certain athletic officials and get baseball reinstated at UNH in the next few years.
Because having no baseball at a New England college is just sacrilegious.
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