Northside is diving head first into baseball season. The Panthers finished 10-14 overall last season, and went 5-7 to land in the middle of the pack in the 1-A Coastal Plains Conference.

Four seniors graduated from last year’s group, but Northside returns the crux of its young, talented core. The seven-man junior class is another year older this time. Standouts like Reg Bishop, Tanner Alligood, Zach Woolard and Parker Boyd have more experience as they head into a season with heightened expectations.

Coach Keith Boyd wants to be competitive in the league this year, which is why he scheduled a grueling non-conference slate. The Panthers traveled to South Creek on Tuesday and will host Columbia on Wednesday for their home opener.

Here’s what Boyd had to say about the Panthers prior to the start of the season.

 

What he saw during the scrimmages:

“Well, I saw some improvement from the Manteo scrimmage to the Currituck one. It seems like out pitching is coming together. Defensively, we seem to be doing well. There are some things that need to get clarified with our cuts. Our hitting is behind, but we’re going to keep working on that. That’s usually, typically, one of the last things to come.”

 

How the pitching staff has looked:

“We’ve been throwing five to six guys. We’re hoping with the new rules for pitching … We feel like it won’t affect us a lot. The four or five we do have, they’re very comparable to each other. We feel like we’re going to get a good outing every night we go out there.”

 

Where the team’s leadership is coming from this year:

“It seems like our vocal leaders that we relied on last year were our young guys. We’re going to miss those guys (that graduated), but they weren’t the vocal type. The few seniors we have — James Barrow is one of those guys, and Ethan Cosentino and Brock Marsh — then throw some juniors in there, we feel like as long as we continue to build our team chemistry, that’s going to be big — especially in tight games.”

 

How settled he is on a lineup:

“We have 12 on the team, and we feel all 12 can play. There’s probably six, maybe seven that … are kind of set in stone. Guys that tend to give us a little more on the mound, we’re really going to lay heavy on them. Then there’s others that can help us with bats, and utility players. Everybody is a piece in the puzzle.”

 

Why the beginning of the season will be time to sort out a batting order:

“That’s going to be a game-to-game basis. I think it will take us two, three, four games before we settle on anything.”

 

Why he scheduled a tough non-conference slate:

“We want to say strong with our non-conference because our conference is typically strong, especially at the top. We’ve been floating around the middle of our conference. To get up in the top of the conference, we’ve got to raise our level. If we raise the level of our non-conference, maybe that will help us prepare better. It hurts you when it comes to playoffs because they take your record into consideration.”

 

What the keys to success will be for this Panthers team:

“I want to take the scrimmages and build on what I saw, which was solid pitching, real solid defense, and some timely hitting. Hopefully we’ll score enough runs to win.”