Dan Zalewski

Associate Sports Editor

To find one of the latest accomplishments of the Millersville Marauders, one would have to travel over 300 miles south to the state of North Carolina. There you’ll find warm days and lots of baseball.

It’s been a long standing tradition for the Millersville Marauders baseball team to travel down to North and South Carolina during spring training. The weekends away from home are not because of leisure but out of necessity for the team.

The 12 hour round trip that the team makes every weekend let’s them prepare for the upcoming season of baseball without the worry of snow or frigid temperatures. Unlike Pennsylvania, North Carolina is without snow and comfortably in the 60s, if not warmer.

The other tradition that Millersville maintained was the dominate performance of the Marauders.

Of the seven preseason games the Marauders have played so far, the team has only lost once.

The Marauder’s spent the first weekend of their preseason in Winston-Salem, North Carolina where they played four games during the three day visit. Winston-Salem State hosted the visiting Marauders, and Millersville left with a nearly perfect 3-1 record.

Two weekends later pitted the Marauders against familiar local teams. The Marauders dominated Pitt-Johnstown, Seton Hill, and Indiana of Pennsylvania in what was a historic weekend.

Mitch Stoltzfus leads the Marauders with a .550 batting average.
Mitch Stoltzfus leads the Marauders with a .550 batting average.

The Marauders recorded 50 runs off of 53 hits, the most in a three day span for the team since 2000, and they had a combined score of 50-13 across the entire weekend.

One of the big reasons behind the Marauders’ success has been the stellar performance at the plate.

Through the first seven games, the Marauders had numerous batters with incredible batting averages. The top of the list includes Mitch Stoltzfus and Brian Novak with a .550 and .500 batting average respectively.

Stoltzfus also has put up a homerun to this point, along with Jeremy Musser, Dan Neff, Ben Snyder and John Brogan. The team has scored six homers in total so far.

Brandon Miller is the PSAC East Pitcher of the Week.
Brandon Miller is the PSAC East Pitcher of the Week.

The other massive reason for the successfulness of the Marauders has been the incredible pitching lead by junior, Brandon Miller.

Miller has led the Marauders to two victories while recording an incredible 0.00 ERA. The Ephrata native has only allowed four hits while recording 14 strikeouts. His ability to suppress batters is so potent that his opponents have an abysmal .103 batting average.

Many of these reasons are why Miller has been named the first PSAC East Pitcher of the Week. He is continuing the trend that he ended with last year when he was named NCBWA Atlantic Region Pitcher of the Week.

The Marauders will continue their out of state tour this weekend. The next matchup for the team will be against UNC Pembroke this afternoon. Afterward the team visits both Saint Rose and Francis Marion before returning Sunday night.