The 2024 baseball and softball season has brought new coaches, opportunities, and the need for some new equipment. Like last year, LaCrosse came down to team up with LHS. For baseball, seven kids from LaCrosse play with two on varsity and two for softball with one on varsity. As for coaches, both baseball and softball have one new coach. Jose Madrid is the new third assistant baseball coach and Brook Stahlecker is the LHS CTE teacher and now the second assistant softball coach.
Last softball season was the best they had in a long time with a record of 10-10. Also, for the first time in eight years baseball made it to state. Both teams would love to make it there this season. Coach Stahlecker has been a great help with the pitching for softball. She pitched in college as well as Head Coach Haney, but having a third coach that knows a lot about pitching makes it easier for Coach Haney to get around to everything.
Coach Haney has many goals for this year’s season. She said, “I want the girls to continue improving with every game and practice. I love to see them create big goals for themselves and the team and reach those goals in the end.” Last year The softball season ended with a 10-10 record and the coaches and players would like to add more wins to the board. Haney also said, “Coach Stahlecker has been a great addition to our program. Her knowledge on pitching has allowed us to have specific pitching workouts which is something we haven’t been able to do in the past.” This team has a lot to look forward to this season.
As for the baseball team, Coach Erway has been doing a great job. With their trip to state last year, the team is hopeful that they will make it once again. Erway said, “Our new coach Jose Madrid has been a great help with our team. He has been primarily helping with pitching which is better for the pitchers as they get more throwing in.” Coach Madrid also played baseball in college at Bethany. Coach Erway likes co-oping with LaCrosse because he enjoys being able to give the kids an opportunity to play baseball since there isn’t a team in LaCrosse. Erway said, “It is kind of personal because I didn’t have a school baseball team, so it’s good to be able to help those kids get that chance.”
Lastly, both the softball and the baseball program are entering this season with the addition of much needed equipment, namely, new nets, as the old nets were in very rough shape. In fact, before the new nets were installed, Head Coach Erway was pitching to the guys and a ball went through the net and hit him in the arm. The softball nets are not much better. There are holes all at the bottom where the softballs get hit out and lost in the trees or out to the grass to be chased all over. Other than the batting cages the fields are pretty nice. The softball dugouts and bleachers were just redone before last season and the baseball field is in good shape.
