Warriors restock with killer recruits
‘An unprecedented amount of interest from high-end guys’
WATERLOO — The Ontario University Athletics sports season is unclear.
And most fall courses at the University of Waterloo will be held online due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
But that hasn’t stopped Warriors baseball coach Ben Norris — and his staff — from hitting a home run on the recruiting trail for the upcoming campaign, if there is one.
“We’ve had an unprecedented amount of interest from highend guys,” said Norris. “It has been cool to see that what we’re doing here resonates with them and that this is where they want to study and play.”
The Warriors have landed nine recruits this off-season with the ultimate prize being outfielder Liam Sutherland, a former Ontario Colleges Athletic Association player of the year and transfer from Humber College. “He’s a guy that we feel we can add to a really strong outfield and help to lock things down,” said Norris. “He’s an excellent defender.”
Sutherland joins Mackenzie Strong, who was the Warriors’ most valuable player last season, and newcomer Alessandro Strazzeri in one of the more exciting outfields in the OUA.
Other recruits include infielders Ryan Kehoe and Garret Jukes, catcher Lucas Ben and pitchers Jacob Ray, Trevor Smith, Aidan Hecker and Hunter Nurse.
The Warriors were 11-11 last season and 2-1 in the OUA championship tournament. It was a tough finish for the crew since they lost their sole game by one run and failed to advance past round-robin play on a tiebreaker.
“It was pretty wild the way it shook out,” said Norris, a 32year-old phys-ed teacher at Waterloo’s Sir John A. Macdonald Secondary School.
“But it also left us thirsting for a lot more for this coming year,” he added.
Luring players has been different during the pandemic. Some top prospects are deferring their commitments for a year while others that were looking at opportunities south of the border have decided to stay home.
Depth was an issue for the Warriors when Norris took over the bench two years back. And this year’s recruiting class will go a long way to addressing it.
Norris, a former Warriors outfielder and captain, has big plans for the team.
He wants to make UW a destination on the diamond, develop players for the next level of baseball and create a winning culture so the Warriors can capture their first OUA banner in school history.
“One of the big mandates … was to ramp up what it means to be a Warriors baseball player,” said Norris.
“To bring forth a work ethic that starts with the coaches and captains and runs right through the whole program,” he added.
“That means focusing on development and understanding that we have really high expectations on and off the field.”