Baseball: Club team to to sanctioned sport?

Two national championships in three seasons, an 18-game-and-counting winning streak, undefeated in conference play conference champions —

The Utah State baseball team has seen sustained success the last few years, but it hasn’t been easy, said head coach Brad Singer.

The team faces a number of disadvantages being a club sport. Chief among them is coming up with enough money to run the club, Singer said.

“Probably 95, 96 percent of what we spend is our own funding,” he said.

The team does receive some money from the university because it is a club sport, but it is not enough for all of the expenses, Singer said.

“We’re having to pay for everything ourselves,” said catcher Colton Anderson.

While the lack of funding is a strain on the players, the biggest problem with it is that it limits which players can be on the team, Anderson said.

“There’s no scholarships, so we can’t go recruit all over the state or all over the country,” he said.

The club has been successful, though, and Singer expects that to continue.

“Like the ‘Field of Dreams’ movie, ‘If you build it, they will come,’” Singer said. “When you win, word spreads.”

Freshman outfielder Alex Munns was interested in playing for the Aggies because he had heard of the success they’ve had.

“I wanted to be on a good, winning team,” Munns said.

Singer said he gets emails almost daily from people who are interested in playing for the team.

“I would love to sustain it and build off of that,” Singer said.

The university is proud of the team’s success, but the athletics department has no intention of promoting the baseball team past club status, said Doug Hoffman, the associate athletics director for Utah State.

“You’d just have to, budget-wise, increase and increase,” Hoffman said. “Obviously that’s not feasible.”

This season, the team is in position for a run at a repeat national title. It clinched the Northern Pacific South conference title after sweeping Idaho State this past weekend.

The next series for the Aggies will be Friday and Saturday against Utah Valley University. The games will be played in Orem at 6 p.m. on Friday and at 12 p.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturday.

— thomas.sorenson@aggiemail.usu.edu

Twitter: @tomcat340