For the Prescott Cardinals, baseball is a numbers game, and they’ve done it as well as any team in the Middle Border Conference throughout the last handful of years in terms of getting kids out for the sport and fielding a competitive roster.

After graduating nearly a dozen players who saw various amounts of varsity action last spring, Prescott’s large aggregation of underclassmen now compete for an abundance of roster slots. Those position battles are ongoing as the Cardinals begin their third week of practice.

For long-time Prescott head coach Jeff Ryan, filling the vacancies left by a decorated senior class will be challenging, but having a large crop of talent to choose from makes it exponentially easier than it otherwise would have been.

“We have 50 players in the program and have really big numbers at the freshman and sophomore levels,” Ryan said. “High school baseball is a numbers game and if you can get 10 or more kids per grade level participating, the chances of success grow significantly.”

According to coach Ryan, more than 70% of the kids involved with Prescott’s 9-12 baseball program are underclassmen, which he believes is a testament to the coaches who dedicated their time to working with those athletes during the summer.

Considering Prescott’s large now-departed senior class, it’s no surprise that the Cardinals have ongoing position battles seemingly throughout the entire lineup.

“We have spots open all over the field,” Ryan said. “Outfield, infield, catcher, you name it we have open spots. The players understand there are a lot of spots up for grabs and the competition for them has been very intense at times.”

Many of those position battles are to replace multiple graduated seniors who had extended tenures with the Cardinals. Notable losses include three Middle Border All-Conference players Phil Seiftert, Mason Bartsch and Justin Syverson, who also earned All-State Honorable Mention accolades for his senior campaign last spring.

“All three of them will be difficult to replace,” Ryan said. “We have some veteran players coming back, but will have several players that will be getting their first taste of varsity action.”

While coach Ryan has some promising young players involved in the aforementioned position battles, he also has multiple returning veterans that he will look to lead the team this year – both on and off the field.

Seniors Brady Block and Dryden Seeley are the returning headliners this spring, in addition to junior Nolan Thomley who is slated to be a varsity regular for the third consecutive season.

Positionally speaking, Prescott has more than its fair share of slots to fill, but the Cardinals’ true depth this season will be on the mound. The aforementioned Block, in addition to senior Wesley Dobbs and juniors Cullen Huppert and Ian Leask all return to the rubber this year.

“On the mound, we have a lot of pitchers,” Ryan said. “Hats off to assistant coach Brad Matzek, who has done another great job of getting a lot of kids ready to pitch this season. Wesley, Brady, Cullen and Ian are back from last year. We have a solid group of sophomores expected to log some innings in Owen Bayer, Dane Pechacek and Cole Platson.”

The returners and their leadership will be pivotal throughout the season, as coach Ryan has put together a 2023 schedule that could very well be the most challenging in the state. The Cardinals are slated to face a murderers’ row of teams in the coming months.

Prescott has scheduled contests against multiple teams ranked top ten in the state, a couple of which are ranked number one including defending D4 champion Eau Claire Regis and last year’s D3 runner-up Saint Croix Falls.

The Cardinals are also scheduled to square off against highly regarded programs including Hudson, River Falls, West Salem, Menomonie, Logan and Lake City, one of the premier programs in Minnesota. Ryan spoke about the slate of games he has created for the 2023 Cardinals.

“We are really excited about the schedule,” Ryan said. “When I was an assistant under Steve Block, one of the things he always wanted to do was play games against quality opponents. I know there are different schools of thought when it comes to scheduling, but playing against top teams I believe only makes you better.”

Part of that grueling schedule is the Middle Border Conference slate of games, which includes a pair of contests against Altoona, a program ranked fifth in the state in the Division 2 preseason rankings.

Altoona won the 2022 Middle Border Conference championship and is expected to be the class of the conference again this season. The Railroaders return eight of nine starters from last year’s sectional qualifying roster.

“The conference will be very tough this year,” Ryan said. “The team to beat is Altoona. They went to the sectional last year and have eight of nine players back. They are extremely talented and won’t have a lot of weaknesses. The goal of our players is to finish in the top half of the conference. The MBC is filled with young talent, especially an impressive group of underclassmen pitchers.”

Prescott is itching to get out on the diamond, but games continue to be postponed or canceled because of the atrocious weather. The Cardinals are scheduled to make their season debut on the road against Somerset on Tuesday, April 11. That game is slated to begin at 4:30 p.m.