Davidson Baseball (10-11, 2-4) is focused on the controllables ahead of their third Atlantic 10 conference series of the year at home against Dayton (14-9, 2-4) this weekend, following back to back win-loss-loss series against Fordham (11-11, 4-2) and at La Salle (11-12, 2-4).

The ‘Cats lost momentum throughout the weekend in their first conference series on the road. After a 17-13 win on Friday, the ’Cats fell 2-8 on Saturday and 1-10 on Sunday when La Salle threw the first no-hitter Davidson has been involved in since the ‘Cats threw one in 2012. The loss came a week after Davidson fell 3-26 to Fordham in a high scoring ninth inning on March 15.

Despite an inconsistent start, captains Wilson Perkins ’26, Anthony Torreso ’26 and Aidan Rice ’26 said the team has proved they have what it takes to harness their energy and resilience to bounce back and win at the conference level.

Most of the starting position players this year are underclassmen. “Usually we have a decent amount of older guys, and this year […] I think we only returned pretty much two starters of the nine guys in the starting lineup,” Torreso said. 

That creates a unique dynamic on the field. Perkins said the “injection of energy” from younger players can make the difference in close games. 

“Even if we’re winning or losing, we have fun on the baseball field,” Perkins said. “We have come back already a couple of times and beat teams in the ninth. […] Teams that don’t have that just fire and resiliency and want to be out there, don’t have those kinds of wins.”

The ‘Cats have demonstrated an ability to stick with close games and shift the momentum when it counts, winning their first conference game against Fordham on March 13 in an eighth inning comeback after giving up five runs in the seventh. Davidson won their first game of the season against Bryant on Feb. 14 after overcoming a four run deficit in the bottom of the ninth. 

Comebacks are a testament to the team’s ability to sit with a difficult position and scrape out a win. 

“There have been a few times where you could have just rolled over, but we ended up finding a way to win,” Rice said. “In years past, there have definitely been times where it feels like, oh, we get behind, and then that’s kind of it. But this team kind of just has a little bit more resolve, which I’m excited to build upon.”

Davidson’s young team is a byproduct of the program’s recruiting approach. Head Coach Rucker Taylor’s emphasis on four year player development is a Davidson Athletics mainstay. It is also increasingly an anomaly in collegiate sports. According to Baseball America, some programs are pursuing older rosters to avoid NIL bidding wars, while high turnover makes it difficult to cultivate team culture.

“It’s becoming more and more rare for an athlete in any sport to show up somewhere and stay there for four years,” Assistant Coach Parker Nolan ’22 said. “That kind of stuff makes it a lot harder for you to build teams and develop guys over the course of their college careers. But I think at least thus far […] [Davidson creates] a really good atmosphere that guys really don’t want to leave.”

The ‘Cats’ young starting lineup, however, was not necessarily intentional. Young players typically spend a year or two developing before getting a starting role. Instead, they were pushed in the deep end.

“They kind of expected to come in and just see where they fit in and kind of treat this as ‘I’m going to get better, I’m going to develop and when it’s time, I’ll play.’ But evidently, that time has come, probably a lot sooner than a lot of them would have expected,” Nolan said.

At the beginning of the season, Nolan said the team did a good job playing without expectations. But mistakes have added up against tougher competition as the ’Cats begin to feel the pressure and fatigue of collegiate play. “The effort is there, the execution hasn’t always been,” Taylor wrote in an email to The Davidsonian.

On defense, the ’Cats have given up an average of 8.95 runs per game. They threw shutouts against Fairfield and Lehigh but have struggled further into the bullpen. 

“Pitching staff has done really well […] commanding games, commanding the strike zone, and getting outs, and then there’s also been days where […] we’re giving up a ton of runs,” Torreso said.

Perkins said the key is to maintain momentum by pounding the zone.

“Baseball is such a rhythm game,” Perkins said. “The problem comes whenever you have a walk and then a hit by pitch and then a walk, then somebody hits that big hit, and then it’s like the infielders and the outfielders kind of go into a wall […] It’s really hard for guys to stay locked in whenever that kind of starts building.”

On offense, the ’Cats have been inconsistent at the plate; they scored 37 runs in a series sweep against Lehigh, but only scored 10 runs in their four conference losses and have averaged 6.57 runs per game. Without power hitting, the goal is simple: stop striking out and start stacking hits. 

“When a pitcher’s having success against us, I think we need to do a better job just adjusting the game and finding a way to either get that guy out of the game or get on base any way we can,” Torreso said.

Nolan said that type of series management is crucial to staying competitive throughout the weekend. The goal is to wear out their pitchers early to make life easier come Sunday. Nolan described Sunday games as a contest of who wants to win more. But energy and resilience only goes so far when the other team has a fresh bullpen and positive momentum.  

“That’s when those ruts can become hills,” Taylor said.

Perkins expects those fundamentals will improve as the team gains conference experience. “We’re a young team,” Perkins said. “I think that as we get more experience under us, we will get better throughout the season.”

The ’Cats’ youthful roster extends to the coaching staff. Nolan graduated from Davidson in 2022, and Pitching Coach Joe Sheridan and Director of Player Development Aidan Wirshing both graduated college in 2020. Their proximity to the game is an asset.

“Having a younger staff may be helpful in that we can remember how tough this game can be and also the ups and downs of being a student-athlete at an academically rigorous place,” Taylor wrote. 

“The game becomes easier and easier the further you’ve gotten from playing it,” Nolan said. “I think we have that humility […] to empathize with the guys in that regard.”

At the end of the day, the captains are keenly aware that enthusiasm, grit and good coaching is no substitute for getting reps and stacking proof that the ’Cats have what it takes to be an A-10 contender. Perkins thinks they do. The challenge, then, is to prove it.

“We need to settle in right now,” Perkins said. “The time is now.”