University of Houston Athletics
Baseball Begins Fall Practice Schedule
9/6/2011 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
Sept. 6, 2011
HOUSTON - The University of Houston baseball team opened fall practice Tuesday afternoon at Cougar Field.
Head coach Todd Whitting and his team took to the field at 2:45 p.m. Tuesday, for the first practice in a schedule that will last through Oct. 16. In their second season at UH, Whitting and his staff are looking to build off the team's success from 2010.
"It's exciting to be back," Whitting said. "It is the second year for our staff and we are really looking forward to building off of the huge positives that we had at the end of the season last year.
"There is a lot of energy here because we have a lot of new players. We have more new players than we have returning players, so we are really going to be leaning hard on the veterans to teach the new guys the expectation level of the program, the pace at which we do things and exactly how we practice."
The Cougars will practice each afternoon with the first intrasquad scrimmage to be held Friday. Other scrimmages will be held during the practice schedule and will be announced at a later date.
With 20 newcomers on the roster this season, the fall practice schedule will be important to the team. In addition to the month of practices, Houston will play host to Rice in a scrimmage Oct. 9 at Cougar Field. The Cougars play a second scrimmage Oct. 16 against Texas in Austin. First pitch for the scrimmage against Rice has not been announced, while the contest against the Longhorns is scheduled to begin at 1 p.m.
"Fall practice is going to be huge for this team because we have 20 guys that have never played Division I baseball, and I am really excited about the two scrimmages that we are going to play this fall," Whitting said. "A lot of the reason we are going to play two scrimmages as opposed to one or none is to get those guys in the fire a little bit and get a game under their belt and get the jitters out. We have two great opponents for those scrimmages, so I am excited for what lays ahead for us."
In addition to the 20 newcomers, Houston returns 14 letterwinners from last season's squad the advanced to the Conference USA Championship title game.
UH opens the 2012 season at 6:30 p.m., Feb. 17 against Delaware at Cougar Field. The weekend series will continue at 6:30 p.m., Feb. 18 and conclude on 1 p.m., Feb. 20.
