ETV News stock photo by Jeff Barrett
The Panthers retake the diamond with a number of new faces. There are only five returners from last year and Pinnacle also has a new coach in Travis Henrie. With the lack of returners, the Panthers are focused on growth and development.
“There’s potential there. Our team’s young, [but] we have a lot of good freshmen coming in,” explained Henrie. “There will be more focus on fundamentals.”
One aspect of the squad that has impressed Henrie is how the team cheers for and helps one another. “The kids really push hard on unity. They look at themselves as being a family, that helps.” Henrie continued, “They support each other a lot. We have a couple of kids that have never played before and they support them 100 percent. It’s a good thing to have on a team.”
Pinnacle will put an emphasis on minimizing mental mistakes and getting better every day. If the Panthers do that, they will find success. “We stack up pretty good. We can be competitive with everybody,” Henrie said.
“It’s going to be a good season,” he concluded. “We have a really good, young group that will be playing with us for a few years. We are going to be able to build a good base this year. That’s the main goal: build a base and then implement more performance goals next year.”