Image provided by: Clackamas Community College; Oregon City, OR
About The Clackamas print. (Oregon City, Oregon) 1989-2019 | View Entire Issue (March 8, 2000)
Sports TI h E CI ac I<AMAS P rìnt ________ 9_ WEdNEsdAy, M arg I h 8, 2000 A field of dreams Improved ballclubs could bring home titles Softball Baseball MANDY GOOD Sports Editor The men’s Cougar baseball team will start out there season this Saturday playing Lower Co lumbia CC at Longveiw Wa.. Then will play Grays Harbor on Sunday at home. The team is hoping for a season that will end in a National title. “We’ve got better foot speed this year; I think that we have great hitting and We’ve had good hitting in the past, we were fourth of fifth in the Nation back in 1995 and I think that, that is the kind of team that we could have,” said Head Coach Robbie Robinson. According to Robinson the tough teams in the league that they will go head-to-head with this season will be Mt Hood, Chemekata, Lane and Linn Benton. “We think that it is going to be a good year for the region. We have well balanced teams,” Robinson noted. The team is made up of a mix of freshman and sophomores. In the fall the team was made up of 78 men. In winter training which went through Ndv.- Dec. they picked 30 guys out of the bunch of 78. Then by Feb. 1 the team is again cut down to about 25 players, then cut again and there are currently 23 men that will represent the Clackamas baseball. “We’ve taken a good group of kids and we’ve got ten down to what we think are the best 23 kids,” ex plained Robinson. “We do have a couple of freshman pitchers that we think are going to do tremendous, and that is Aaron Shanks who is a left handed pitcher out of Madison, Colin Elliot a right handed pitcher/shortstop out of Se attle, and a kid that we just picked up out of the blue, that I think is going to be just tremendous, who is George Schler out of Forest Grove.” The Cougars have a team equipped with experienced pitch ers, stronger depth in the middle field, a strong out-field and more team speed then the prior year. Ac cording to Coach Robinsin, the team is going out with the tools that will make for a successful sea son of ball playing. “It looks real good. We're strong pitching-wise. We’ve got great depth in the middle field, which was are weakness last year. Shortstop and second, we have strength there this year so we are compensating for last year. Our out field is playing re ally strong and we are going to hit better than we hit last year,” explained Robinson. “Top to bot tom, 1 -6, our team should be very good.” JOHN THORBURN Sport: Baseball Head Coach: Robin Robinson Top returners: Greg Palmer, Glenn Boss, Robert McCoy Keys to victory: With some of the best pitchers in the Northwest, the Cougars are loaded. History: 1996 was the last time the Cougars held at least a share of the league title. The program must break out of late- season stumbles that it's seen in the past. Editor-in-Chief 11 members of a squad that fin ished fourth in the Northwest and captured a share of the league championship last year, return for another run at a conference title. With only 14 players on the ros ter this season, Head Coach Paul ' Fiskum feels that it is his ‘most ex perienced’ club to ever wear a Clackamas softball uniform. Sport: Softball Clackamas having won seven of Head Coach: Paul Fisk urn the 12 conference titles since the ad Top returners: Melanie dition of softball to the Northwest Warthen, Darby Needham, Summer Conroy; 11 returners Athletic Association of Community from league champion squad Colleges [NWAACC], Fiskum chooses his words carefully when Keys to victory: Pitching is comparing this year’s squad to the best asset this season. champions of the past. History: CCC has been the “Talent-wise we stack up with team to beat over the past some of the best teams we’ve ever decade—winning 7 NWAACC had, “noted the 12-year veteran soft- championships. ball coach. “Our whole starting in field is back and two starters in the outfield are back. Plus an all-league pitcher; we’ve never had that kind of experience return. But experience The baseball squad isn’t what wins: talent wins. This is practices infield plays in a bunt situation. The a very talented group.” Cougars are an While the Cougars boast expe improved bunch in rience and talent, depth is not an every area, according to element that Fiskum can brag Head Coach Robin about this season. Carrying only Robinson. 14 players when it usually lists 18 on the roster, the sophomore-domi nated team doesn’t have much room for injury. “With our depth factor, we just have to hope that we stay injury- free,” noted Fiskum. “We’ve got 14 excellent players but if we get an in jury then we’ 11 definitely feel it. If we get an injury in our pitching staff then we’re going to be hurting.” This season, the Cougars are mw ■ carrying the usual three pitchers on their roster. An injury which sidelined Freshman Jolene Adams in recent weeks, however, leaves the squad with only two legitimate JOHN THORBURN I Clackamas Print threats for the start of the season. Vanessa Applegate “Right now, it’s pretty takes hitting practice much on Mel [Warthen] and from Jolene Adams Darby’s [Needham] shoul during practice on ders,” noted Fiskum. Monday afternoon. Applegate is one of 11 Winning most of the returners from a team NWAACC titles that have that finished #4 in been contested in softball, Washington and the Cougars hope to take Oregon. part in this year’s champi onship tournament in Spo kane—a place that has been welcoming to Clackamas softball. Fiskum has won two championships in the Eastern Washington city with the most recent com ing in 1996. He feels that 2000 in Spokane will be a good spot for his squad. “Some schools don’t have the right to say that their legitimate achievable goal is to win an NWAACC JOHN THORBURN I Clackamas Print title every year. We’ve, for a number of years, have had The baseball team's first home game is this Sunday against Grays Harbor College at1 p.m. the right to say that and this team’s The softball team's first home game is March 31 against Chemeketa at 2 p.m. no exception.”
