Van-Far baseball is going to look a lot different from previous years.

The Indians’ roster this season has little similarity with Van-Far from even a year ago and the program even has a new head coach. Cameron Huff takes over in his first head coaching job after graduating from college and being an all-conference and all-district catcher for Wellsville-Middletown when they finished second in the state in 2017 and won a district title in 2019.

Huff is aware that 2018 is the last time Van-Far baseball won a district title and that the program has only six wins in the four seasons after that. He hopes having an increase of kids of 22 from about nine a year ago will be the beginning of good things.

“I was able to get a lot of boys,” Huff said. “I recruited a lot of boys from football – a lot of our athletes. I was like, ‘Hey, give baseball a shot.’ We’re looking alright right now.”

One of the kids he convinced was his younger brother Carson Huff, who just finished a solid season with the basketball program after transferring in from Wellsville-Middletown. The coaching staff is also excited to welcome transfers from Fulton: twin brothers Malik and Tyson Douglas. The Douglas brothers each made the football all-conference team for Fulton this past season after playing football and baseball for Saint Jeanne de Lestonnac Catholic in the state of California.

Having that many more kids means Van-Far will have a junior varsity squad this year, Huff said, but also that competitiveness will be brought out as boys fight for limited varsity spots. Ultimately, the coaching staff that includes Dustin Elledge and Josh Buatte has more options and boys are less likely to be playing out of position.

“It makes it so much simpler with more boys,” Huff said. “They can learn from each other. I have a great group of upperclassmen who are leaders. Gage Gibson takes change in the middle infield.”

Huff emphasized he wants to build a program that will earn or at least compete for a district title within the next two years. The greater number of players means there will be quite a few boys with little to no baseball experience, but Huff sees that as an advantage.

“A lot of coaches are like, ‘We’re going to be inexperienced and going be down’ but I look at inexperience as a plus,” Huff said. “They don’t have bad habits yet. I can teach them proper ways to play.”

Huff said the number of returning players includes Gibson, Reece Culwell, Gibson Condie, Tarion Aguirre and Bransen Salmon. Culwell is an all-conference player and the only returning all-conference Indian with the loss of Nikos Connaway to the golf team.

Culwell was Van-Far’s No. 1 pitcher a season ago with a 3.32 ERA in about 50 innings pitched and expects to fill that role again. Huff expects Tyson Douglas and Carson Huff to slot in behind him and others like freshmen Ronnie Stanich Jr. and Brady Puls to be in the mound mix.

At the plate, Culwell had a .275 average and .431 on-base percentage and leads Huff’s key returners.

“He’s going to take a big role on his shoulders this season,” Huff said. “Gage Gibson is another returner that’s going to take a big role (at second base) and Gibson Condie is going to have a big role on his shoulders. He’s a catcher, and I was a catcher myself so I’ve been working with him.”

State qualifier cross country runner Garrett Hopke is among the group of freshman Huff has his eye on, Gaven Gaston is a sophomore joining the team that will be patrol center field, the Douglas brothers bring great bats and gloves to the team, senior and college football signee Blake Foster brings quickness.

Funnily enough, Huff said the runner Hopke is probably the team’s slowest guy even though he is still pretty quick in a sprint. That’s just how much speed the Indians have with their roster.

“We’ve got speed so we’re going to aggressive on the basepaths this year,” Huff said. “We’ll look to utilize that speed to our best interests.”

Huff wants to win “year after year after year” to establish a winning culture to baseball like the school has in football and basketball.

 “Coach (Pat) Connaway did great things with these guys,” Huff said. “Taking them to the next step is what I want to do.”