After a three-year losing streak to Benilde, the teams’ ongoing support for each other and the ability to stay focused is what contributed to the teams’ 7-1 win, according to sophomore Jack Wandmacher.

“We love each other, we play as a team, no one gets down and we don’t get too high. We are just a good team,” Wandmacher said.

Coach Brian Kelly said the team was determined to beat Benilde and knew if they worked together they could pull off their first win against Benilde in three years.

“I thought we played great, we haven’t beat Benilde in three years and we came out with a mission to stay process based, one pitch at a time,” Kelly said. “(We made sure) to not get ahead of ourselves but we knew if we played a really good game we would have a good chance to win.”

Although the team has good chemistry and defense, they struggle with recovering after a strike, according to Wandmacher.

“We played as a team, almost everyone hit, we played really well defensively,” Wandmacher said. “(One weakness) is looking through strikes, it’s something we can’t do.”

Kelly said the team came out with a well-executed plan and stuck to it.

“I was proud (of) the guys’ approach and they stayed really focused,” Kelly said.

According to Kelly, Park baseball had mistakes at the beginning of the game that the team will work on in the future.

“We fell behind a couple of hitters,” Kelly said. “Lots of swings and misses early in the game so obviously always trying to sharpen our skills offensively.”

Wandmacher said knowing the weakness of a team before you play and practicing will create a winning team.

“Whoever we play we just have to know errors, that’s been our biggest problem,” Wandmacher said. “Practice makes perfect.” 

According to Kelly, the team has only lost two out of seven games so far because the team knows how to have a good time but also stay focused.

“I firmly believe that it’s because we are loose and having fun, we enjoyed ourselves,” Kelly said.

According to MN Baseball Hub, Park was defeated by Robbinsdale Armstrong 6-1 the following day, April 26. Echo will provide additional coverage relating to the most recent game.