USD Baseball 1998

1998 Preview Returning to the starting lineup for '98 are sopho- more second baseman Sean Skinner, senior short- stop Jeff Powers , sophomore third baseman Tony Lopresti and outfielders Juan Garcia and Chris Humpert. Skinner hit .299 in his freshman season , the second highest freshman batter behind catcher Alan Leuthard who hit .313. Powers numbers dropped a little in '97, but was a wee Honorable Mention selec- tion in his sophomore year. LoPresti had 18 RBl's and 40 hits in his freshman season and was a defensive standout at third base. Garcia will move to right field this season after spending most of his time in center during his first two years while Humpert takes over centerfield duties. Only four newcomers are on this year's squad and three of them are infielders. The lone pitcher of the group is David Waters , a 6-0 freshman out of Horizon High in Scottsdale, AZ. Joe Lima (6-0, Fr, Mira Mesa High), Dominic Repetti (6-3, Jr, De Anza College) , and Dion Light (6-1 , So , Riverside C.C.) will battle for playing time on the left side of the infield . This year's non-conference schedule opens with a

trip to the Univer- sity of Arizona in January . The Toreros February schedule includes a trip to Hawaii to take on Hawaii- Hilo, co-hosting of the San Diego Baseball Classic and a three-game series with Minne- sota at the end of the month . The wee schedule will have a different look this year, be- ing split into two di- visions for sched- u Ii ng purposes . The Toreros will

Junior catcher Tony Betancourt

play home-and-home series with the three teams in their division (Coast) beginning on the road with San Francisco on March 6th. Pepperdine and Gonzaga are the other two teams in the Toreros division . USO will face the teams from the West division (Santa Clara , St. Mary's, Portland , and Loyola Marymount) just once. All series will be three games in length .

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