Full Centennial Conference Poll Release
HAVERFORD, Pa. - The Centennial Conference unveiled its 2020 preseason baseball poll on Wednesday, with the conference's head coaches ticketing Haverford to a return trip to the Centennial Conference tournament for the 14th time in the last 16 seasons.
Johns Hopkins, the defending Centennial Conference champions, were picked to repeat that feat with six first place votes and 78 total voting points after reaching the College World Series a season ago. Swarthmore, a 2018 CWS participant, was picked second with the other four first place votes and 70 total voting points after missing the conference tournament in 2019. In a testament to the strength of the league, the Centennial is the only conference in the nation to have a team advance to the College World Series each of the last two seasons.
Franklin & Marshall edged Haverford for the third place vote, pulling in 62 total voting points, while the Fords (57 total voting points) eclipsed fifth-place Dickinson (43). Washington College (40), Ursinus (39), Muhlenberg (34), Gettysburg (17), and McDaniel (10) rounded out the poll in sixth through 10th place, respectively.
Haverford must replace a senior class that had a wealth of postseason experience and made up a strong core of the lineup and pitching staff. Luckily for the Fords, the rising junior class, headlined offensively and defensively by Centennial Conference Gold Glover of the Year and co-captain Will Karp, seems up to the task in 2020. Lineup stalwarts Luke Wallis, Harrison Burns, and Owen Plambeck will also all come into their senior seasons after formidable junior campaigns, while Zach Landry will be back from a first-year campaign in which he started 33 of Haveford's 40 games in the middle infield. A deep bench earned plentiful experience a season ago, with Haverford using the early portion of the challenging schedule to get reps for a large group of first-years.
On the pitching staff, the Fords return all but 76 of their 335.2 innings pitched a season ago, as D3Baseball.com All-Region pick Nathan Bass and second-team All-Centennial selection Andrew Johnson headline a deep and talented staff while Brandon Jenkins will return for his senior campaign after emerging as a relief ace for the Fords in his All-Centennial junior campaign.
Baseball has won three conference crowns, rising to the top of the Centennial in the 2012, 2014, and 2016 campaigns. The Fords reached the Centennial Conference final a season ago after a dramatic extra-innings victory over F&M in the semifinals. After reaching the 20-win mark for the eighth time in the last 10 seasons, Hverford begins the 2020 campaign in earnest on Saturday, February 29 with a doubleheader on the turf at No. 11 Kean. Haverford will face off with the Cougars (11:30 a.m.) and Susquehanna (2:45 p.m.) on the turf in Union, N.J.