KNOXVILLE — When the University of Tennessee baseball team hosts East Tennessee State Tuesday night, several former high school stars from the Knoxville Area will have a homecoming.
The Buccaneers (12-2) and the Volunteers (14-2) have a longstanding rivalry, which will be renewed Tuesday at Lindsey Nelson Stadium with first pitch slated for 6 p.m.
Knoxville has a rich high school baseball tradition and many of those players head north to Johnson City to play for the Bucs upon finishing their respective prep careers in the Knoxville Interscholastic League and in surrounding counties.
ETSU has nine players with Knoxville Area ties on its 2020 roster.
Freshman infielder Ashton King and first-year pitchers Landon Smiddy and Owen Kovacs all played for Farragut High School. They all finished their high school careers on top as the Admirals won the 2019 Class AAA Sate Championship.
Hunter Loyd, a freshman pitcher out of Christian Academy of Knoxville, where he played for legendary coach Tommy Pharr, was a member of three consecutive state championship teams for the Warriors, who claimed back-to-back Division II-A crowns in 2018 and 2019 after capturing the Division I Class AA title in 2017.
Sean Kearney had a stellar career at Knoxville Catholic High School. Jackson Greer played high school ball at Knoxville Central. Bubba Hubbard, a junior college transfer from Walters State Community College, hails from Morristown.
Junior outfielder David Beam was a two-way star at Bearden as a pitcher and outfielder, while freshman catcher Noah Webb, a Kodak native, played high school ball at Sevier County.