Nebraska Baseball Coach Will Bolt confident in experienced group ahead of fall ball
Head Coach Will Bolt and Nebraska Baseball kicked off fall baseball this week.
The Huskers are coming off a largely successful 2024 season. They won the Big Ten Baseball Tournament for the first time since 2019. However, they couldn’t make it out of the Stillwater Regional in the NCAA Tournament.
NU has three weeks of practice before facing Wichita State on Sept. 21 at Haymarket Park.
Here are three main things we learned from Head Coach Will Bolt’s meeting with the media on Wednesday:
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Huskers finally have experience.
This new version of a Nebraska baseball team is very experienced. For the first time in a couple of years, Nebraska returns the bulk of its production in all three phases of the game.
Nebraska didn’t have to rely as heavily on portal addition this off-season as last.
“It wasn’t like you just have returning role players, you have returning players that were feature players from a championship team,” Bolt said.
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Nebraska returns Tyler Stone, Cayden Brumbaugh, Rhett Stokes, Dylan Carey, Joshua Overbeek, Gabe Swansen, Case Sanderson and Riley Silva. All of them were staples in the Bolt’s championship lineup in 2024.
Nebraska loses the Big Ten Pitcher of the Year Brett Sears. However, they also return 70 percent of their innings pitched from last year’s team. This could be a huge advantage for the Big Red, giving highly thought pitching coach Rob Childress another year with so many of the same guys.
Nebraska’s second ace last season, Mason McConnaughey, will return and looks to be its Friday starter. Other pieces like Jackson Brockett, Drew Christo, Jalen Worthley, Caleb Clark and Ty Horn will also compete for jobs in the starting rotation.
Impact of increased scholarships is unknown
There is still a lack of clarity on scholarships in baseball in this new world of college sports. Earlier this summer, the NCAA increased its scholarship limit for baseball from 11.7 to 34. Bolt does not know how many scholarships Nebraska and other schools will utilize.
The fifth-year Husker Head coach said he was flying to Chicago on Wednesday, Sept. 4 for a meeting with the Big Ten to get more clarity hopefully.
Bolt said he is very confident in Nebraska’s position financially. He understands the challenges this can present in recruiting. The uncertainty of scholarship numbers is unfair to high school recruits, he said.
He said that New Nebraska Athletic Director Troy Dannen has been great to work with through the unknowns.
Bolt is confident NU will be just as competitive
Bolt is confident that his team will be as competitive and tough as last year. He makes a point to his team every year that he wants them to be the “toughest” team in college baseball. It is the style of baseball Bolt loves and expects year in and year out from his guys.
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He seemed to have that last year for the first time since the 2021 team. Bolt thinks there is a very good shot the 2024-25 squad will have the toughness again.
“That’s how culture gets built, is when you’ve got good returning players, hungry young players that are getting pushed by the other guys and you have got a big group of returning guys that are basically saying this is how we do it,” Bolt said.
Having experience returns on the field and in the locker room helps establish a long-lasting culture.
“That’s how culture gets built, is when you’ve got good returning players, hungry young players that are getting pushed by the other guys, and you have got a big group of returning guys that are basically saying this is how we do it,” Bolt said.
Returning right-handed pitcher Drew Christo for another season was an experience and culture booster for the Huskers.
“It was a bit of a surprise that we got Christo back,” Bolt said. “I think that was a huge piece of the puzzle because there wasn’t really a person in the portal that would bring back his leadership No. 1 and production No. 2. So getting him back was big. He had the decision to sign and came back. That’s a big win for the Huskers.”
