SEASON PREVIEW: WCU Baseball Opens 2020 Campaign Saturday at Maple Zone

WEST CHESTER, Pa. - West Chester University baseball begins its 2020 season on Saturday and Sunday with doubleheaders against the College of Saint Rose and Jefferson University. Due to the snow that blanketed the southern part of the East Coast overnight, the games, originally scheduled to be played in Dinwiddie, Va., have been moved to Maple Zone Sports Village in Aston, PA.
 
WCU has been selected sixth in the Atlantic Region preseason poll by the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association and third in the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference East Division preseason poll by the league's head coaches.
 
The Golden Rams went 31-16 last season. They reached the PSAC semifinals and made their sixth NCAA Tournament appearance in eight years under head coach Jad Prachniak.
 
West Chester will have a new look in 2020 as junior shortstop Justin Horn (Willow Grove, Pa. / Upper Dublin) and senior starting pitcher David Mervis (Gathersberg, Md. / Gonzaga) are its only returners from a group of six 2019 all-conference honorees.
 
"Anytime you have a good season," Prachniak said, "chances are that you have guys leading the way who move on shortly after. We're not looking to replace them. We're set up a bit differently this year. It's going to have to be a sum of all parts being consistent one through nine to make up for some of those losses."
 
The players voted and the coaches approved Horn, Mervis, graduate outfielder Drew Jarmuz (Kennett Square, Pa. / Unionville) and senior catcher Corey Webb (Easton, Pa. / Easton) to be this season's team captains.
 
"It's a good mix of personalities with some guys that will lead by example and some vocally," Prachniak said. "There's even good positional balance. They've all earned that spot."
 
Aside from the captains, Prachniak listed junior starting pitcher Zach Rice (Honey Brook, Pa. / Twin Valley) and junior reliever Nick Picariello (Philadelphia, Pa. / Germantown Academy) as returners that are expected to have a key impact this season. Picariello was named preseason second-team all-region by the NCBWA on January 27.
 
Senior Ryan Calhoun (North Wales, Pa. / Germantown Academy) and junior Nick D'Amore (Philadelphia, Pa. / Neumann Goretti) are new transfers that Prachniak labeled as guys who can play multiple positions, and junior transfer Braeden Fausnaught (Danville, Pa. / Danville) is anticipated to come in and bolster the starting pitching rotation.
 
Sophomore JR Gifford (Doylestown, Pa. / Archbishop Wood) will presume the catcher position while Webb is sidelined with an injury, and promising junior Hunter Reeser (Mohnton, Pa. / Governor Mifflin) will get his awaited chance to step in at first base. Junior Matt Daller (Exton, Pa. / Malvern Prep) missed 2019 with an injury but he's another one that's planning on filling a spot in the infield this year. Prachniak added that junior outfielder Zach Wright (Burlington Country, NJ / Northern Burlington) as well as graduate pitchers Tyler Forbes (Athens, Pa. / Athens Area) and Culver Hughes (Exton, Pa. / West Chester East) will have important roles on the team.
 
"We always focus on the season in front us while maintaining an understanding of what's worked for us in the past," Prachniak said. "We have expectations of consistently working hard and focusing the whole time because there's good baseball being played at this level. It sounds simple, but putting it into practice at all times is the challenge with any group."
 
Prachniak owns a 266-125-1 overall record entering his ninth season at the helm. He needs 32 wins to pass Neil Serpico as the program's all-time winningest head coach. Serpico led West Chester for 17 seasons.
 
"At a place that has a strong history in baseball," Prachniak said, "it's obviously cool to be mentioned with some of those guys. With really good players and good assistant coaches, this place sets you up to be successful. That's what made this job enticing, and it's followed through on all of that."
 
The Golden Rams have won 32-plus games in three of Prachniak's eight seasons, winning the Division II National Championship in 2012 and 2017. WCU has never missed the PSAC Tournament since Prachniak took over, and the team won the championship in 2012 and 2016.
 
Saturday's doubleheader versus the Golden Knights begins at noon, and Sunday's DH against the Rams begins at 11 a.m. West Chester's first home games come in a three-game series against Saint Thomas Aquinas College that begins with a doubleheader on February 29 starting at 11 a.m. and ends with a single game on March 1 at noon. PSAC play begins March 20 with one home contest against Mansfield University at 2 p.m.
 
"I like that there are segments to our schedule," Prachniak said. "There are many tests in the beginning to define our roles from pitching staff to lineup and then a lot of conference games right out of the gate. Within a couple weeks we'll be nine conference games in, and that start could be as important as anything to kind of lay a foundation for the season."