Baseball fans in Athens had to wait only a few weeks for America's pastime to return to Bob Wren Stadium, this time in the form of the Southern Ohio Copperheads.The Copperheads are 10 games into their fifth season as a member of the Great Lakes Summer Collegiate League, and so far their hopes to improve upon their mediocre 17-25 record from 2005 have been stymied by a slow start.We're 4-6 right now and we haven't even played all that great
said new coach Stas Swerdzewski. We've pitched pretty well and we've hit well in spurts but not consistently. The defense we've played has been pretty much terrible the entire year.Swerdzewski, a former all-conference player and current volunteer assistant coach for the Winthrop Eagles, took over the head coaching responsibilities from former Copperhead coach Andrew See this season.The Copperheads four wins came 6-0, 2-0, 5-3 and 6-5 at the expense of Delaware, Granville, Xenia and Grand Lake, respectively.My first goal is of course to win the league
Swerdzewski said. But then
on top of that
summer collegiate baseball is a great time for kids to get individually better. It's a good time for these players to develop and hone their skills. Then they can go back to school ball in the fall and be a lot better ball players. So far the Copperheads have fared neither better nor worse on the road or at home, posting 2-3 records at Bob Wren and away from it ' a big difference from the 2005 season when Southern Ohio was 12-9 at home and a dismal 5-16 away from Bob Wren.Swerdzewski said his pitching thus far has been impressive. Right-hander Kurt Smith pitched seven shutout innings of two-hit ball against Granville while fellow righty Mike Kirschenheiter has proved to be a solid closer in tight games.There has been one aspect of the game Swerdzewski would like to see his team improve on, however.What seems to be killing us is we've been getting down big early and then having to scrape our way back in
he said. It'd be nice to go out there
try and get an early lead and go from there.Southern Ohio enjoys a brief stint on the road this weekend with a doubleheader starting at 1:30 p.m. Saturday against Lake Erie before returning home for another doubleheader Sunday with Grand Lake. The first pitch on Sunday is set for 1:05 p.m. at Bob Wren Stadium.Our fans have been great, Swerdzewski said. We've been running close to 400 fans a night. As far as the places we've been to in the league, that's tops in the league.",",17,Archives,Mark Shugar,200606223563midsize.jpg,Southern Ohio Copperheads' pitcher Jordan Alvis leads his team to a win during the Copperhead's match against the Delaware Cows Tuesday
June 14. The win marked the first victory of the season for the Copperheads
who are set to take on the Granville,",",",","
14421,2006-06-22 06:00:00,Despite stellar pitching
Copperheads off to slow start,",Baseball fans in Athens had to wait only a few weeks for America's pastime to return to Bob Wren Stadium
