Ithaca baseball prepares for season opener

It has been over a year since Ithaca College baseball saw its season come to an abrupt end during a multistate road trip last March. After just seven games took place last year, head coach David Valesente is still waiting to coach his team on Ithaca College’s Freeman Field for the first time.

Fortunately for him and the Bombers, the coming weeks will be full of baseball. Starting March 27, Ithaca will play 25 games in 44 days with 12 doubleheaders. It’s a welcome sprint for a team that missed out on nearly the entirety of last year’s games.

Valesente, who was hired before the start of the 2020 season, looked back on the past year of coaching a team that couldn’t play.

“Last year and the cancellation of the season, it was devastating,” he said. “It was heartbreaking for athletes all over the country. [The year] went by slow, but it also went by fairly fast. Going into my second year here at Ithaca, I’ve still yet to coach and be part of a game on Freeman Field here. We’re pretty excited to get things rolling this spring.”

Coaching virtually was not how Valesente envisioned his first year at the head of the program going. He adapted to the situation, though, to ensure his players continued to develop away from the field.

“It’s been just a tremendous amount of communication and programming virtually,” Valesente said. “For us, we were not engaged with our student-athletes in the fall. Unfortunately, they were remote, so many of them were at home with various amounts of resources. We kept tabs on players and were pretty strategic with our approach for maintaining strength and body weight and kind of tailoring things to each individual.”

The good news finally came March 1, when Ithaca College and the Liberty League announced a return-to-play plan for spring sports. Valesente recalled that day.

“It was incredible,” he said. “It was something that we’ve been waiting to hear for a long time, officially, to get the green light to compete. Having the news to be able to play this spring is almost a dream come true for these student-athletes to be able to get back out and compete in something that they’ve waited so long to do. For many of them, it’s been a year or more since they’ve had the opportunity to do that.”

Moving forward, the Liberty League has set strict protocols to ensure the season can take place safely. A big part of Valesente’s job this season is to make sure the team is adhering to those protocols properly.

“We’ve had to strategically alter our practices around volume and how many people we have in the facility at one time, how they’re coming and going and what groups they’re in,” Valesente said. “We’ve strategically put them into certain pods depending on position and where they live. We’re organizing practice around pods and how they’re rotating in and out. Every single minute of their day now is structured, essentially, around some of these protocols to keep them safe and others around them safe.”

With much different circumstances surrounding this year in comparison to a normal baseball season, Valesente still has the same outlook for the upcoming slate of games.

“Our goals aren’t going to change,” he said. “At the very top of the list would be to execute every day as safe as we can. We’re showing up to the ballpark, and we’re expecting and demanding the same things that we always have in terms of how we compete and carry ourselves, and playing against the game. Ultimately, we do that the right way and the guys are having fun. It’s going to be an awesome spring.”

For any team, having leadership from players has been extremely important in a year like this, and it’s no different at the collegiate level. For the Bombers, they are looking to seniors Garrett Callaghan and Jack Lynch, as well as Ithaca High School alum and graduate student Buzz Shirley to be the leaders of the team.

“They’re stepping up to the plate in terms of that leadership role,” Valesente said. “Garrett, Buzz and Jack have all assumed that captain and leadership role on our team, and they’ve done a really nice job at it so far. They know that we’re expecting them to lead both on the field and off the field. We’re confident in their ability to be able to help us compete in games and continue to do what they’ve done in years past.”

The first game for the Bombers is just over a week away, when they start the season with a doubleheader against the University of Rochester March 27. After over a year away from the field, Ithaca Baseball is ready to hit the ground running.