Baseball Seniors Breaking Records
Oskaloosa–Three members of the Statesmen baseball team recently made history by setting new school records.
Despite having just one full season under their belts, plus last year’s COVID-shortened season and this year’s 31 games of play, pitcher Chase Stratton (Sr., Clearfield, Utah, Sports Management), first baseman Jarrett Hunt (Sr., Logan, Utah, Digital Communications), and second baseball Adrian Garcia (Sr., Ontario, Calif., Mechanical Engineering) have all placed themselves at the top of some significant career lists.
Stratton is now WPU’s career leader in strikeouts with 221. The southpaw snapped a mark of 214, set by Dan Mell (2004-2006), doing so with seven Ks against Graceland on April 2.
Stratton began his navy and gold tenure with 109 strikeouts in 2019, and then followed that up with 57 in 2020. He currently has 55 this spring, highlighted by 12 in a no-hitter versus Northwestern on February 27. The senior has recorded nine double-digit strikeout performances, including a career-high 14 against Mayville State in 2019.
Last weekend (last Saturday to be exact), Hunt became William Penn’s career leader in runs scored with 104, breaking the previous record of 103 by Tedd Goldman (1986-1987) and Marcus Lee (1992-1994).
The first baseman has already touched home plate 34 times this year, while also scoring 34 times in 2019. As impressive as those two campaigns were/are, he was on pace for an extremely-memorable season in 2020 as he scored 36 times in just 30 contests.
Hunt has posted 28 multiple-run outings, headlined by a pair of four-run games in 2020. The senior has also walked 60 times in his three years in the navy and gold, which surpasses the program’s highest mark prior to this year. Unfortunately for him, he has a current teammate who is even more adept at drawing base on balls.
Garcia currently has an all-time career-record 68 walks to his WPU resume. The senior snapped the record on March 9 against Lincoln and current has 18 base on balls this spring. The previous career record of 56 belonged to Tony Squire (1995-1996).
Garcia, who has 13 multi-walk showings, has a single-game high of three on three separate occasions. He reached first base on the four-ball plate appearances 16 times in 2020 and 34 times in 2019.
It is possible other records may also fall this spring as the Statesmen (23-8, 12-4 Heart) have at least 12 more regular season games scheduled this spring.
