Jaguars baseball team aims to continue building a competitive program

Fourth-year head coach Chris Howell enters the 2020 campaign with four seniors, eight juniors and 20 sophomores and freshmen on the Augusta University baseball team.

The team looks relatively young on paper, but Howell feels he has the right mix of players to not only compete, but also to help build up a baseball program that has had only four winning seasons in the past 15 years.

“I’m happy with our numbers. We have athletic guys that can bounce around (and play more than one spot) and that helps,” said, Howell, who is 54-88 overall and 36-59 in the Peach Belt Conference. “We have eight guys that started as freshmen and now they’re juniors. They’ve been in this league and they know what it’s about. It’s a great league day in and day out.”

Howell will depend on his upperclassmen to lead the way this year, but he did acknowledge how crucial it is to have that experience entering the season, from lifting weights in the morning to afternoon practices.

“They know what it takes and what they have to do … they know the preparation,” Howell said. “It’s tough to explain to some of these new guys, the energy and the feel of a Peach Belt game, even on the road. At home, you’re familiar with it, but when you go on the road, it can be unfamiliar for a lot of these new faces. For the upperclassmen that have been in some high level baseball those are the guys that have to step in and be ready to go.”

While Howell said the game is faster at the college level, he said the biggest thing the incoming players need to remember is to not complicate the game. “It’s still a game of baseball. We’ve been playing it for a long time; just keep it simple, have fun and enjoy the competition.”

Howell said North Georgia, USC Aiken, Columbus State and Young Harris all have good squads and pointed out the conference has had a lot of success over the past few years in the regional and national championship settings. The Jaguars added Claflin to their schedule this year, which finished 25-18 and joined the conference as an associate member last season.

But Howell knows his squad will have to take care of themselves and not worry about what everyone else is doing.

“We have got to keep our goals and perspective; we’ve got to take one day at a time,” he said. “We have to get in the (conference) tournament. That’s our goal. That’s one of the things this group is working toward every day. They’ve got to work hard, play hard and play the game the right way. Be good to the game and the game will be good to you.”