WOODBURY – You might expect baseball players’ favorite memories to be about big plays or impressive stats, but they’re usually about what happens off the field.

Senior captain R.J. Barksdale explains his favorite memory from this season. 

“My favorite bus memory from this year is probably the bus ride back from Buffalo Wild Wings. It was pretty fun. Trevor [Santopietro] threw a bottle that was filled with ice at Cam Jones’ head, and it exploded all over his head, so that was pretty funny,” said Barksdale. 

Matt Dutton, another senior captain on the team, shares his favorite memory from this season.

“My favorite memory from senior year is when we got a chance to play at Dunkin’ Donuts Park for the first time since our freshman year,” Dutton said. “We destroyed Kaynor Tech, 15-2.”

Senior Trevor Santopietro has a similar favorite memory as Dutton. 

“One of my favorite memories is back when we won the Dunkin’ Donuts Park game,” said Santopietro.

The boys have many goals for this season, as it’s their final one.

“My goal is to be a good captain and to be a good leader to show the younger kids how we play baseball on a varsity level, and try to bring a BL title back to Nonnewaug,” said Dutton. 

Barksdale has some more personal goals. 

“My goal for this season is to make the playoffs and do really well in them, that’s my goal for the team,” he said. “My goal is to keep getting hits, and producing runs, and trying to help everybody get over little mistakes that happen. I want to help everybody, like if someone makes a mistake on the bases I help them keep their head up, and me personally I have to do my job at catching the ball in the outfield and making plays, and also keep getting hits and keeping the team up.”

Santopietro explains his goals. 

“We all want to win, we all want to make states, we’re having a pretty good year so far and personally I want to do what I can do to be a leader for my team. I have to be there in the right mindset for younger guys on the team,” said Santopietro. “I didn’t get voted for captain this year and I took that personally, so I’m trying to be a leader on my own.”

Dutton sees his role as a captain as a way to teach the younger players. 

“I see it in a good way because people are going to look up to me and when there is a senior there I will do the same. I taught them to the younger kids that are starting to play,” said Dutton. 

The boys are having a pretty good season so far with a record of 12-4.

“I’m coming off one of the worst seasons of my career, last year my junior year. I knew this year I had something to prove being my last year,” said Santopietro. “And I’ve exceeded those expectations so far into the season.”