Glen Lake baseball is returning to the diamond in 2025 after winning its 12th consecutive district championship and fourth Northwest Conference championship over the past 10 years.
The Lakers defeated Lake Leelanau St. Mary and Suttons Bay last season to capture a dozen district titles. The Lakers finished the season with a 27-4 record.
Glen Lake lost in heart breaking fashion in the regional semifi nal against Muskegon Western Michigan Christian 7-0 in extra innings.
Glen Lake senior Peter Gelsinger is returning with excitement and enthusiasm.
“I definitely get excited for baseball. I’ve been playing my whole life, so when it comes around, you start to put all the fundamentals together that you’ve worked on in the offseason onto the field, it’s a good feeling,” Gelsinger said.
Gelsinger is primarily a pitcher and utility player for the Lakers. The senior advice is to never take any rep for granted.
“Give it your all every time and don’t take any reps off,” he said.
The Lakers will have to replace production from seniors Cooper Bufalini and Aiden Gokey among others that led Glen Lake last year.
Glen Lake has a lot of returning players including Benji Allen, Joey Rioux, Braden Roush and Tanner Crick, to name a few.
As far as identity, the Lakers are trying to establish their own identity along with developing chemistry.
A total of 29 players will sport the Lakers uniform for varsity and junior varsity teams. There are over 30 players in the middle school program.
“The future looks really bright,” Glen Lake coach Kris Herman said. “(Our players) have a lot of potential to have a really good season. The nice thing about these guys is they tend to stay in a moment really well.”
During the first couple weeks of the season, all teams are focused on the fundamentals along with mixing strategy before entering the regular season that is starting fast and furious over the next couple of weeks.
Unlike last year, local baseball teams have only been outside a handful of times, but last year there were as many as two dozen practices outside before the first game.
Herman thanks basketball, football, and wrestling coaches Jason Bradford, Jessie Smith and Luke Moeggenberg for keeping the guys in shape.
“We’ve got a whole bunch of kids in this program right now that really know how to compete at a high level, and that’s only gonna benefit us,” Herman said.
Another senior, Braden Roush, had this to say about the upcoming season.
“It’s Bitter-sweet definitely because it’s always great to be an athlete and going to new college is also gonna be exciting too, but just having it be your last season, you really wanna lock in and just have a lot of fun and take it one game at a time,” he said.
