IRVINE, CALIF. — Concordia baseball embarks on a new season, with some new faces, and a new mindset in 2019. The Eagles were picked third in the PacWest preseason poll behind 2018 PacWest Champions Azusa Pacific and runner-up Point Loma.

"I think being picked third is realistic going into the year, APU and Point Loma have done it the last couple years at the top of the conference" said Turgeon. "We're hoping to make some noise up there this season". Head Coach Joe Turgeon enters his fourth year as the skipper for Eagles Baseball. 

The Eagles went 19-21 in conference play in 2018 with an overall record of 22-28. Concordia finished the year by winning five of seven games at home. This season, the previously youthful squad returns 19 players and welcomes 14 newcomers. 

Juniors Haloa Dudoit and Bailey Collins return to lead the Eagles at the plate. In 2018, Dudoit started and played in 50 of 50 games and totaled 173 at bats. With a .308 batting average and 53 hits on the season, Dudoit lead Concordia Baseball at the plate. Collins also earned 173 at bats in the 2018 season and finished with a team high slugging percentage of .543. 

Coming off of an injury, Jair Donovan will return to the middle of the Eagles lineup as a redshirt sophomore and play right field. 

In addition to the return of experienced players, Concordia picked up a few new assets including Shane Hersh in the middle of the diamond and Matt Lautz in the outfield. Brett Vansant and Andrew Stout were added to the bullpen and Collin Villegas behind the plate. Calvin Schonebaum and Carl Turner will also be newcomers to watch in the outfield. 

"We knew coming into this year that we needed to fill a couple spots, whether that was physically, emotionally or attitude wise, we needed to add to what we had coming back," Turgeon said. "We've been really young the last couple years and right now we're really junior heavy so with their experience, and some new players, we should be able to have a successful run."

To open its season, Concordia Baseball will host two-time defending West Region champion UCSD. The Tritons were most recently ranked No. 4 by the 2019 NCBWA Division II Preseason Top 25. The first two contests of the three game series will be played at Eagles Field, with the finale hosted by UCSD. 

"Its always fun playing UCSD. They always have really good guys that we look forward to playing against. Having good competition to open up our season and seeing what we can do together as a team is always fun," Dudoit said. "The group that we have this year has bonded really well so far.  I think its going to be a great year just because of the relationships we all have with each other."

First pitch is scheduled for 1 p.m. at Eagles Field on Feb. 1 (game time has been moved up one hour from the originally scheduled time of 2 p.m). Sunday's game at UC San Diego has also been moved from 11 a.m. to noon. For the complete Concordia baseball schedule, click HERE.