Gaucho Baseball is Fired Up and Ready 

A deep pitching staff and seasoned core of position players have put the UCSB baseball team in position to make noise in the Big West Conference and beyond in 2024.

A disappointing finish to last season with a potential Big West Championship and NCAA Tournament bid erased by a dreadful showing in the final series of the regular season left a lasting impression on everyone involved with the program. Eight months later, the opportunity has finally arrived to turn pain into prosperity.

“I think everybody was pretty bitter and motivated. It left a bad taste in everybody’s mouth. You don’t get to play the next weekend, your season is over, and you have to sit on it for eight months before you play again,” said UCSB baseball head coach Andrew Checketts. “What did we learn from it? There’s lots of stuff. We talk about proactive leadership. I think the details got away from us a little bit last season in regards to baserunning and putting the ball in play. Some of those little things that I think traditionally we’ve been pretty good at.”

Overall, starting pitching was a strength for the Gauchos last season, but depth was a challenge at times, and the front-line guys faded down the stretch, especially in the decisive final series against Hawai‘i. This season, UCSB will boast a pitching staff that has impressive top-end talent as well as quality depth to match.

Last season’s ace and Friday-night starter, Matt Ager, returns to lead what projects to be one of the top rotations in college baseball. Ager was named preseason First Team All-American as well as preseason Big West Pitcher of the Year by D1 Baseball.

In addition, former freshman All-American Ryan Gallagher, who missed all of 2023 with an elbow injury, returns. Gallagher was 8-0 overall with a 3.00 ERA in 78 innings pitched across 14 starts and one relief appearance in 2022.

Senior lefty Mike Gutierrez battled injuries last season, but still finished with a 4-2 record and a sterling 1.67 ERA in his nine starts. Sophomores Tyler Bremner and Reed Moring will be competing to crack the weekend starting rotation. Both had very solid freshman seasons and have the stuff to start and dominate lineups.

Freshman Jackson Flora will also contribute significantly on the mound, whether it be as a starter or in a relief role. At 6′6″ and with a fastball that can reach the high nineties, Flora was named the preseason Big West Freshman Pitcher of the Year by D1 Baseball.

“We’ve got some competitiveness for the weekend rotation. I haven’t announced anything. Obviously, the guys that have the inside track are the guys that did it last year, so Ager, Gutierrez is back, and Gallagher, who was the Big West Freshman Pitcher of the Year two years ago, comes back from injury,” Checketts said. “We’ve also got Bremner, Barrett, Moring, and Flora. All of those guys have starter stuff and are also in the mix.”

Sophomore Hudson Barrett will likely headline the UCSB bullpen after garnering Freshman All-American honors last season. He finished with a 5-1 record and a 1.92 ERA with 82 strikeouts in 61 innings during 2023. Barrett is ramping back up after an offseason injury but should be ready for the season.

Freshman Cole Tryba is also a freshman who will likely contribute out of the bullpen to begin his career. He is an undersized left-hander with great feel for his pitches.

The overabundance of talented arms has left Checketts with good problems in terms of how to deploy them.

“I brought them all in last week and told them, when the music stops somebody is going to be left without a chair,” said Checketts of the internal competition among his pitchers.

A potential key to the season will be the development of the juniors who will be taking on more of a leadership role, including LeTrey McCollum, Aaron Parker, Zander Darby, Ager, and Gallagher.

All of those players have already made significant contributions to the program on the field and in hindsight represent a very talented recruiting class.

“They have kind of been in the shadows from a leadership standpoint because we have had other big voices in the program, so this has really been their first year to have both hands on the wheel from a leadership standpoint,” Checketts said. “That’s something we’ve spent a lot of time on and worked on to try and develop those skills.”

Darby was an iron man for UCSB last season, starting all 55 games at third base. He finished with a .289 batting average with seven home runs. He played his summer ball in the Cape Cod league and honed his craft against some talented pitchers.

“I felt like I had a lot of personal growth over the summer. I was facing really good arms on a daily basis, and so that kind of forced me to naturally adjust my swing and get used to really good pitching,” Darby said. “I’ve carried that into this year, my third year, and so it’s definitely been an easier transition due to that experience.”

Ivan Brethowr is also a junior, and he is draft-eligible after this season. He transferred into UCSB last season from Arizona State and was an All–Big West First Team selection after hitting .314 with 10 home runs and 13 doubles last season. He figures to be a key cog in the middle of the UCSB lineup.

An injury midseason halted Brethowr’s momentum and had a noticeable impact on the UCSB lineup. Staying healthy will be a key to reaching his potential in 2023.

“For me, it’s just getting ready to perform at the next level as well. Not saying ‘It’s okay, I’m good right here. I had a good season last year; why don’t I just do that again?’ I’m not satisfied with that. I want to dominate,” Brethowr said. “That’s what I want our team to do, and that’s what I think our lineup can do. We have plenty of guys in the order that are going to make big improvements on last year when they already had great seasons.”

UCSB baseball has had to overcome its fair share of adversity this offseason as a project to renovate the playing surface to turf was halted by the Coastal Commission, leaving the Gauchos scrambling to find an alternative.

The team has been moving around all offseason, using the fields at Westmont and SBCC, among others, but it has impacted the amount of scrimmage time and situational work the team has been able to get in.

“We’ve bounced around so much, and there’s so much up in the air from a daily and weekly basis in regards to the schedule and practice location,” Checketts said. “They’ve all had a pretty positive attitude about everything that’s going on and doing everything they can to get themselves ready.”

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The Gauchos open the season at Campbell University (in Buies Creek, N.C.) on Friday, February 16, beginning at 2 p.m. See ucsbgauchos.com/sports/baseball for more info and the schedule.