BRISTOL — The St. Paul Falcons are two seasons removed from winning a state championship, but what does that mean? Last season, that meant going into the season with the focus of defending their title.
The Falcons finished the regular season 17-3 and with the top seed in the Class S State Tournament. They competed in the Naugatuck Valley League Championship and fell in the quarterfinals of the state tournament.
A successful season, but one the players felt that they had come up short of their own and perhaps the state's expectations. This season, two years removed from a title simply means how well can the underclassmen get acquainted to playing at the championship standard of the St. Paul program.
St. Paul coach Victor Rinaldi said the approach to this season is to continue to prepare to have a successful season.
“We know what we have as far as our pitching staff, the lineup is going to be a little different. We graduated a few seniors and we're only returning three starters,” Rinaldi said. “We're going to need some of our younger guys that didn't play much varsity last year to step up and it’ll just be a question of how quickly they can step up and contribute. I mean, we definitely have talent. We just have to show it on the field.”
The three returners from last season include junior pitcher and Wofford commit Logan Rembish, junior catcher and UMass Lowell commit Cal Chance and sophomore AJ Corrado
Rembish, Chance and senior first basemen Arden Polverari will be the team’s three captains this season.
Rinaldi said he has high expectations for this year's team.
“We don't have a very senior heavy team. We do have a talented freshman bunch that have come in this year that we're going to ask them to contribute right away,” Rinaldi said. “We have a few other sophomores in the line up as well…We have a fairly young team, but a young talented team and I think we're going to be in every game with the pitching and defense that we play. So, we're looking forward to the season.”
The pitching staff last season with All-State and current Franklin Pierce pitcher Jamie Leggett was one of the strengths of the team last year. Rinaldi said despite graduating an All-State pitcher, the position group still remains as the strength of the team.
“Logan is back, Logan is going to be the anchor of the staff, but then we have, again, Kyle Wilson who's also a senior, and a few other guys that are coming back and younger guys that are going to help right away,” Rinaldi said. “We're really excited to have them and I think it's going to be a good year on the mound for us.”
The Falcons will need all hands on deck as soon as the season gets underway thanks to a tough opening week. After the Falcons season-opener on Saturday, St. Paul will play back-to-back games on Monday and Wednesday at home against Ansonia and Holy Cross.
St. Paul will then close out the week Friday against Kennedy.
Rinaldi said despite the tough start, the team’s goals this season will be to continue to be in the mix for a league title and a state championship.
“There's no real number of wins that we're aiming for,” he said. “We're just going to take it one game at a time and try to win one game and try to compete in every game that we play.”
