Archers defeated Saline County Monarchs 14-1 at Busch Stadium
By: Isabelle Williams, Staff Writer and Ashley Biundo, Production Manager
On Wednesday Sept. 18, the STLCC baseball team defeated the Saline County Monarchs 14-1 right after the Cardinals defeated the Washington Nationals 5-1. Head Coach Scott Goodrich said that it is a really good experience for the team, especially the new players.
“I tell our players, it’s not really about winning and losing here, it’s really about just getting out here and experiencing on the field,” he said. “For someone who’s never been here before on the field, you can tell it; it’s a pretty exciting opportunity for them just to get out here and be in the stadium.”
“This is my first year playing at the stadium. This is actually my first time ever playing at the stadium. So it was a really good experience,” Freshman Trevor Abney said. “I’ve walked around the field a bunch of times but I’ve never actually played here. It is a fun time and now me and my teammates are out here killing it.”
Freshman Luke Lageman said that it is really cool to be able to play where the guys at the high level play and Freshman Tyler Ferguson said “it was an experience to remember.”
Playing at Busch Stadium in the preseason every year has brought a lot of positives to the baseball program such as being able to afford the travel expenses for games, according to Goodrich.
“It is a big fundraiser for us that we do all year; it’s like a fun opportunity and we had to sell 600 tickets for this, so we made about $7,000,” he said. “It also helps us get our guys sweatshirts and sweatpants and hoodies and all those extra things. We have a really good budget that allows us to do a lot of things with this and it allows us to do the extra things that are good for our players.”
Goodrich said that when they play at Busch Stadium, it is mainly to see his players having fun. “This is about as low pressure and low intensity that we do so it an opportunity for everyone to have fun and enjoy baseball and not worry about the wins and not worry about the losses,” he said. “Not worrying about if you make an error. It’s just a good opportunity to have fun with your teammates.”
Although it is preseason, Goodrich said that he is seeing the team’s strengths.
“Pitching has been our strength. We think today was a really good indication that we just do it. I think we only walked one guy all day [at Busch],” he said. “We go in with quality pitching and usually have good defense that is very confident and that’s a good thing to have at this point in the year because I think our offensive can grow and we’ll do that as the year goes on.”
With strengths comes high expectations for the upcoming season. Goodrich said that this season is no different than before.
“I don’t think our expectation this year is any different than any other year. We expect to compete to win the regional,” he said. “That’s our goal every year; we want to win the region. Get on a postseason play and hopefully compete at the national level.”
A new year comes with new players, and this season Archers baseball welcome 30 new players. Thirty players in community college is a huge turnover, according to Goodrich. It is also another strength the team has.
“I think one of the really good things like having 30 new players that it’s an opportunity for us as coaches to mold them the way we want to because we only have a handful of players that were on the team last year and the guys that are coming back are very good players,” he said. “They’re very impactful for us. So we can really guide those new players to follow the returning players. They know what we expect and know we want them to do so for we don’t have any negatives everybody has started with a fresh slate.”
Goodrich said that it is exciting that they can get the players going the direction they want to go.
The team has had it’s struggles in the past and according to Goodrich, they are working on offense.
“We’re clicking and already really good on that. So we need to grow offensively. For some of the guys who were on the team last year, we struggled a little bit in certain areas,” he said. “That’s a real focus offensively; we want to reduce our strikeouts and we want to maximize RBIs. We have base runners on to score more runs and I think if we continue to improve on that little we can be successful in the spring.”
Freshman Luke Lageman throws the ball from first base. 
Freshman Garrison Hibbs slides into second base. 
Blane Besse talks with his team before the game starts. 
Freshman Ajay Sager runs past third base. 
Freshman Sam Bennett catches the ball. 
Jacob Fleming gets ready to pitch the ball. 
The Archers on the big screen. 
Brandon Ulm steps up to the plate and gets ready to bat.
Being able to coach at Busch Stadium every year has been rewarding for Coach Goodrich and seeing all the players expressions as they hit the field, he said. “The most rewarding thing is looking at people and players that never played here before. And it’s kind of like they’re very wide eyed,” he said. “We brought a couple of the guys on the field before the game and they were like ‘man I can’t wait to go out there and play.’ So that’s really cool. But also seeing the players that never played here and hear their parents cheer for them and hear them when their names are announced. That’s the coolest part about this whole deal.”
