After a winning start to the season, the Madison Area Technical College baseball team looks to keep the momentum going following a spring training trip to Arizona. The defending regional champion WolfPack team recorded seven wins and four losses during the week long trip.

Over a third of the players returned from the 2010 team. Coach Mike Davenport said the depth on the roster is one of the team’s biggest strengths. With a mix of second and first year players at different positions, the coach believes that the team is good with what they have and not too far away from where they want to be.

During the 2010 season, the team made it to the NJCAA Division II World Series, won the regional championship, and recorded 44 wins and 15 losses. Davenport was quick to dismiss expectations of their past success. Although he says it is cliché, Davenport believes in a simple principal in preparing his team.

“We have no expectation for record. You take one game at a time. We preach a model of consistency,” Davenport said.

During the trip, Davenport was pleasantly surprised to find out just how consistent his team was, on and off the field. According to the coach, the team played good teams. Although the competition was high, the team won five out of the last six games they played.

“We were right about the character of the guys. They are courteous, good kids,” Davenport said.

Coming off the trip to Arizona, Davenport spoke of the team’s composition. He lauded the team as an able group and said the depth of the team will help it remain solid in all facets of the game.

“The theme since the start is to try to be better tomorrow. We probably can’t play at the end of the year if we play really great and really bad. We have to stay consistent,” Davenport said.

In the future Davenport hopes that the team will be able to grind out games and be solid defensively. One principal that he teaches to the team is, whether the outcome of a game is good or bad, learn from the experience.

The WolfPack will play their home opener against College of Lake County on April 8. The team will start a six game homestead a little over a week later on April 16 against Triton College.