The USC Trojan baseball team is trying to turn things around with new head coach Andy Stankiewicz on board. Given the mediocrity of Trojans baseball over the past half-decade, Stankiewicz had a tough task ahead of him. His first season has significantly exceeded expectations. He emphasized how fully he is committed to reviving the USC baseball program (h/t Thomas Johnson of The Daily Trojan).
“I’m not sure I got too many hobbies outside of this,” he said. “Probably not a good thing. My life is centered around these young men and this baseball program. And being as good as we can be as quickly as we possibly can be … My hobby is USC baseball.”
USC has begun the season 17-10-1 overall and 9-3 in Pac-12 play, so things are off to a promising start in Southern California.
After a stellar run as the head coach at Grand Canyon, he came to USC, and he is happy to make the transition despite the difficulties that lay ahead:
“To me, [USC] is one of, if not the, historically, most prestigious collegiate baseball programs in the country. And I grew up here in Southern Cal, not too far from campus here. And so I’ve just always believed in the school and believed in this baseball program…[I] certainly knew we got some big challenges in front of us,” Stankiewicz said. “But I just wanted to be a part of helping USC baseball get back to where I think and I believe we need to be.”
The Trojans have 12 national titles in baseball, which is the most of any program in college baseball, so expectations are meant to be high for this program. Stankiewicz is reviving that standard in his first several weeks on the job.
[mm-video type=video id=01gxbnz0v8frjbxxzyvd playlist_id=none player_id=01f5k5y2jb3twsvdg4 image=https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/upload/video/thumbnail/mmplus/01gxbnz0v8frjbxxzyvd/01gxbnz0v8frjbxxzyvd-3d12bb45d0dcf8f3ad7395393485f749.jpg]
[lawrence-auto-related count=1 tag=696091895]