By Luke Szoke

Senior Ricky Gorrell, of the KU baseball team, is starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel for his college athletic career. Starting his career in Royersford, Pa., he has come a long way from his first step up to the plate with all of his hard work and dedication to the sport.

“Coming out of high school and trying to imagine that I would be at this stage in my life was unbelievable,” Gorrell said. He never thought his college career would come to an end after his great freshman year batting a .346 average. Even though his past two years have not been the best, the work put toward the seasons were outstanding.

The future looks bright for the senior as he will be graduating in May with a bachelor’s of science in sports and leisure management. He said, “Why would I want to study anything else in school other than sports.? I mean my life revolves around it and I would not want it any other way.”

All I had to say after that was “Pro ball?” Gorrell being reserved said, “It has always been a dream to play in the big leagues ever since I started playing, but right now I’m staying focused on the season at hand.” With KU being three quarters through the collegiate season his focus needs to stay with the team.

The KU Golden Bears, with contribution from the senior third basemen have an overall record of 14-12 and a conference record of 5-11. As the season comes winding down, only five more conference games are left to play to give KU the chance to go to the big show.

“We are a very young team this year despite the records and all, when we play as a team there is no one in our conference that can stop us,” Gorrell said.

“With the end of the season in mind, we started talking about how it felt to win a PSAC (Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference) Championship with the Golden Bears last year.” He said,                  “There is no greater feeling than walking onto the field, putting every single ounce of energy you have and in the end walking off the field with what we worked for all year.”

KU is going to miss a player like Gorrell after he is done with this season. The determination and hard work skill set that he brought is something every team needs.