Veterans Hope to Lead Baseball Cats to Even Bigger Accomplishments
The 2024 Kentucky baseball team reached new heights for a program that has been playing baseball for over 100 years. For the first time ever, the Cats played in the College World Series. It was a goal that UK head coach Nick Mingione had talked openly about since the day he was hired and the 2024 UK squad made it happen.
So what do that Cats do for an encore this year?
“Now, the next step is to win it. That would be the next thing. That’s the next thing to knock down,” Mingione said. “Over nine years, really eight seasons, we’ve been to three Super Regionals after (playing) for 120 years and having zero. We’ve been to three in eight. It’s good to make it, but that wall has been knocked down and now we have to win the whole thing. Got another wall knocked down, but we’ve got another one to go.”
UK has 29 new players on its 44-man roster, so it is essentially a brand new team. However, there are some holdovers from last season and Mingione hopes that those veterans can help the new players acclimate to the Kentucky baseball culture.
“I’m super proud of the guys we do have back,” Mingione said. “We have a saying in our program ‘the standard is the standard’ and they’ve done a phenomenal job of teaching and leading and showing what the standard looks like. I’m glad we have guys who have been there and done that and that can also show the guys and teach them what it’s supposed to look like. It’s going to be super important.”
Having the experience of making it to Omaha for the College World Series is something that UK’s returnees will call upon this season. According to outfielder/pitcher James McCoy, that experience really pays off.
“We know what we need to work on and we know how to attack that,” McCoy said. “If you don’t know, you’re lost and you’re trying to fix 30 things at once. I think that’s a big part, knowing exactly what it is.”
Left-handed relief pitcher Jackson Nove has enjoyed talking about the Omaha experience but also knows that there’s another step remaining for the Cats.
“I have talked about it a lot with all of the friends and family back home,” Nove said. “How cool it was to go to Omaha, to win the SEC, it was super, super awesome. I’m super excited that we got to do it but like Coach Minge said, it’s not the end goal. Obviously, we broke that door down and got there, but the goal is to win it.”
Nove knows that it will be tough to go back but he likes the direction this team is headed.
“It’s going to be a difficult thing, bringing in a lot of new guys,” Nove said. “But being one of the older guys, trying to instill that culture into the new guys. Super excited about what’s to come.”
McCoy believes that this group is ready to do what it takes to give the Cats a return trip to Omaha.
“For sure. Nic McCay, he’s a seventh year (player). He definitely wants to win and go to Omaha,” McCoy said. “Even the younger guys, they see what we did last year and they want to do that, too.”
With veterans like McCoy and Nove leading a group of talented transfers and freshmen, the Cats have their eyes set on a return trip to the College World Series and, perhaps, reaching that next goal of winning the championship.
