FIRST PITCH
For the seventh-straight year and the 10th time since 2013, the Arkansas Tech baseball team will be among the participating field at the Houston Winter Invitational, which is once more set to be played at the home ballpark of MLB's Houston Astros, Daikin Park.
The Wonder Boys will be joined in downtown Houston for the opening weekend of the Division II college baseball season by a highly-competitive group of teams including: Arkansas-Monticello, Ashland, Jefferson, Mississippi College and of course, the hosts, Central Missouri.
Over the course of the weekend, the Wonder Boys will take on (rv) Jefferson on Friday, No. 18-ranked Ashland on Saturday and Mississippi College on Sunday. Two of the three opponents won over 30 games last season in Jefferson and Ashland with both making their respective regional.
TECH(NICALLY) SPEAKING
The Wonder Boys enter the 2025 season with several familiar faces from a team that claimed a share of the Great American Conference regular season championship and earned an at-large bid to the NCAA Central Region Tournament for the second-straight year. For Tech this season, they return four players from their everyday lineup and six arms that appeared in at least 12 games a year ago with three of those being from the weekend rotation.
Among those returning weekend arms are John Gray, Emiliano Mata and Jack Rector. All three started at least 15 games with Gray logging the most starts with 17. Gray would also go on to garner all-conference acclaim with second team honors. The trio also recorded at least 60.0 innings of work and combined for 186 strikeouts.
On the offensive end, the top returning hitter in terms of average is Brendyn Bard. The Kansas City, native would garner Honorable Mention All-GAC honors after he hit .327 (66-for-202) with 13 doubles, one triple and three home runs while also driving in 34. Cole Dawson, Grant Jones and Christian Olea make up the other three hitters from the everyday lineup that return in 2025. Olea hit .311 (66-for-212) with 14 doubles, four home runs and drove in 38. Jones hit just under .300 at .294 (53-for-180) with 10 doubles, two triples, three home runs and 26 RBI. Dawson would hit .250 (39-for-156) with seven doubles, two home runs and 28 RBI.
Leading the Wonder Boys once more is Dave Dawson. The all-time winningest coach in Tech Baseball history, Dawson enters his 16th year in the dugout for the Wonder Boys. In his previous 15 seasons, Dawson has guided amassed a 450-311 record. He has also had eight seasons with 30 or more wins which includes the 2014 season in which he led the team a program-record 44 wins and hosting rights for that year's Central Region Tournament.
Overall, Dawson is in his 20th year as a head baseball coach at the collegiate level as he spent four years as head coach at Kansas Wesleyan and totaled 118 wins. His combined win total at Tech and Kansas Wesleyan have him with a career record of 568-402.
SCOUTING JEFFERSON
Last season, Jefferson went 33-17 overall and were 18-6 in the Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference (CACC) during the regular season to earn the No. 1-seed in the South Division. Jefferson would reach the title game of the CACC Tournament, but fell to Post, 4-3. Despite that, the Rams still earned an at-large bid into the East Region Tournament.
Ahead of this season, Jefferson is picked to finish first in the CACC South Division according to the league's preseason coaches poll.
The Rams are slated to return eight starting position players and four pitchers from their breakout season a year ago.
Offensively, the Rams return their top-two hitters in terms of average in Joshua Lopez and Gabe Silva. Lopez, a First Team All-East Region selection, hit .370 (61-for-165) with 16 doubles, one triple, seven home runs and 60 RBI. Silva, a First Team All-East Region selection, hit .351 (52-for-148) with 10 doubles, two triples, two home runs and 40 RBI.
On the mound, the Rams return three starting pitchers that made at least seven starts last season in Albert Bobadilla, Tyler Behm and Gabe Silva. Bobadilla posted a 7-1 record with a 5.49 ERA and struck out 41 in 59.0 innings. Behm made seven starts and was 6-3 with a 5.95 ERA and 26 strikeouts in 39.1 innings. A two-way player, Silva went 4-2 and posted a 2.58 ERA with 51 strikeouts across 38.1 innings.