Whittemore has excelled building WNC program

Building a junior collegiate baseball team from scratch is a huge undertaking. Not only do coaches have to worry about things like putting together a facility, establishing donors and being the bridge between the team and a college that has never had athletics, but they have to find a group of players that can win games.

Western Nevada coach D.J. Whittemore is in the middle of year four at the helm of the Wildcats, who have been a winning team since their first season in 2006.

Since then, Whittemore has gone 139-71-2 and had eight players sign professional contracts and 21 more go to Division I schools. But even with all the success, he has struggled to find players in his own back yard.

The Wildcats, who play Eastern Utah in a four-game series beginning at noon Saturday, have had 27 Northern Nevada players on the roster in four seasons.

The number looks decent on first glance, but 19 of those came in the first two years. This year's team has just three " Brian Barnett (McQueen), Eric Maupin (Galena) and Cavin Hill (Reno).

"A couple years ago we offered 15 Northern Nevada athletes scholarships and had two of them sign with us," Whittemore said. "Northern Nevada has been very slow to catch on. There's never been community college athletics in Northern Nevada and certainly not a baseball team. High school coaches and the kids are used to going to Northern California to play baseball and so it's made it difficult for us to recruit locally."

Feather River Community College in Quincy, Calif., about two and half hours northwest of Carson City, has 14 Northern Nevada players on its roster.

The school, though, has a lot more history under its belt. The program has been the go-to team for area athletes since 1997.

WNC also has to compete with Nevada for those who aren't sure if they want to go to a two-year program or a four-year. Major League Baseball draft rules let junior college players become draft eligible after just one year, but if they attend a four-year school they must wait three years.

The Wildcats have been forced to travel to Las Vegas for the bulk of their roster, despite Scenic West Athletic Conference rival Southern Nevada's hold on the area. They have 10 Southern Nevada players on their roster and have had 42 total.

"We prefer to recruit in-state players and we have recruited kids from Las Vegas," Whittemore said. "There's been more kids from Las Vegas than any other single place in the history of our program."

WNC might have had one less local on this year's roster if it weren't for Maupin, who transferred from Washington State.

"It gives a place for kids who are good to come when they don't want to go to UNR or can't go to UNR," Maupin said. "I think if you have the opportunity to come here you should, it's a great place to play baseball."

The Wildcats have lost local players to CSN in recent years including former Damonte Ranch star Matt Gardner, who has committed to play at Nevada next season, and two more Damonte players committed to CSN for next season. They received a written commitment from Reed's Casey Yocom and verbals from Tyler May (Douglas) and Ryan Baker (Manogue) for next season.

"I don't even know how many of the Northern Nevada high school coaches have even been to our facility," Whittemore said. "We don't get a lot of coverage in the Reno newspaper and because of that it's been a little secret down here in Carson City that we've been winning."