Photo courtesy of Laura’s Photography Pictured above is the Canby baseball team. Team members include: Riley Kockelman, Trevor Olsen, Riley Sigler, Bryce Hansen, Parker Viessman, Presly Viessman, Tanner Drietz, Nolan Harding, Tyler Sayre, Dylan Bruns, Hunter Cleveland, Peyton Anhalt, William Weber, Jordan Ries, Kaden Reyerson, Evan Stoks, Easton Antony and Kalib Greeman.

CANBY – After hovering around the .500 mark a season ago, the Canby baseball team will look to bounce back in 2019 under head coach Ryan Arndt.

The Lancers return a balance of veteran leadership and young talent, including four seniors in Riley Kockelman, Bryce Hansen, Nolan Harding and Evan Stoks. Rounding out the rest of the roster will be juniors Trevor Olsen, Parker Viessman, Tyler Sayre, Dylan Bruns, Peyton Anhalt, William Weber and Kalib Greenman, sophomores Tanner Drietz, Hunter Cleveland, Jordan Ries and Kaden Reyerson and freshmen Riley Sigler, Presly Viessman and Easton Antony.

Arndt said they will need to turn to their senior class to provide leadership for their group.

“Evan is our leading pitcher from last year, he throws pretty hard and has a lot of change-ups. Nolan will be behind the plate and he’s really good there defensively as well as on offense,” Arndt said. “We’ve got Bryce out in the outfield, who’s a senior and Riley’s back in the infield and that’s a nice addition for us from last year.”

Arndt said during the first couple of weeks of practice, they’ve been working on their in-game situations as well as getting some live batting practice in.

“Just trying to get in some game situations while we’re in the gym,” Arndt said. “Last week, we got our brand new cage set up, so we were able to have our pitchers throw to live batters, so that’s been a big help for us.”

As for expectations, Arndt said they’ve set their sights high and sees their deep pitching rotation as a key factor.

“We’ve got some pretty high expectations that we can be able to do something. We’ve got a lot of pitching, we’re pretty deep in pitching, which is nice,” Arndt said. “The first game didn’t turn our way, but we threw three guys out there and they all looked good, so that was definitely a good thing for the future.”