Baseball Team Celebrates Season

In the cafeteria, decorated with blue and white balloons, the varsity baseball team held their end-of-the-season banquet Monday night.

Head Coach Bryan Hedgecock, who led the team to a 14-11 record this season, started the dinner by thanking the parents for their support and the other coaches as well. 

Hedgecock referred to the season as a journey. Since it was Hedgecock's first year coaching in Chatham, he took the players out for pizza at the start of the season to get to know them better.

The first practice, Hedgecock recalled, was “kind of a mess.” He knew he had to change the mindset and attitude of Chatham baseball, and he knew the easiest way to do that was to win.

As Hedgecock introduced each player, he gave statistics, stories and memories particular to that player from the season. He described the seniors as a group of student athletes who were willing to do “whatever it took to get wherever they wanted.”

Though the season was filled with rains which forced them to practice indoors, the team ended with a regular season record of 14-6, batting average of .318, .436 on base percentage, and a 4.13 era.

Tim Gallagher, the varsity assistant coach, along with JV coaches Nick Ciccarelli and Dave Fowler and freshman coach Jim Ascolese, also shared memories at the baseball dinner. The feeling of comraderie throughout all three of the teams was evident.

Ten seniors will be graduating this year: John Byrnes, Joel Phillips, Michael Fox, Gregg Bazzani, Tommy Devito, James Damato, Brain D'onofrio, Brain Ballard, Brendon Kaufman, and Matt Reader.

Despite the loss of many starters, Hedgecock said he looks forward to coaching the team. He knows the underclassmen have the experience and the confidence to fill the seniors' shoes.

“We learned a lot, myself and the kids, on how to play and compete. It was a very successful season,” Hedgecock said.