sports
14 Sports
Red & Black
13 November 2020
Student Athlete Spotlight: Nick Drake ‘21
Courtesy Jill Kalinski
The Presidants celebrate after a Super Regional Series Victory over Misericordia.
Nicholas Krugh Red & Black Editor
Nicholas “Tahfi” Drake ‘21 has been a member of the Washington & Jefferson baseball team for three years. Drake is from Canonsburg, Pa. and he attended Canon McMillan High School. He started playing baseball 15 years ago and had always wanted to play baseball in college. Because he grew up in a local area, he had often heard about W&J’s prestige. He knew W&J had a great academic reputation and
an even better baseball team. It just so happened that he was good enough to be able to play for the tough program. In high school, he played first base and third base. However, he has transitioned to a starting pitcher at W&J. Drake believes that the most challenging part of his position is throwing pitches to make the batter strike and limiting barrels, which are hard hits. Even still, Drake rises up to the challenge. “Every play starts with you. There’s a certain level of confidence you need to have with each pitch and trust in your mechanics to execute,” Drake described the importance of his position. W&J baseball is coached by
head coach Jeff Mountain, Nic Rush and Josh Crummer. Coach Mountain has led the team to great accomplishments during his time at W&J and it is a privilege to play under him. Drake accredited the coaching staff ’s success to their experience, “Coach Mountain and Rush have years of experience under their belts. Josh Crummer played under Mountain, so he understands the coaching technique and the players’ point of views.” Drake’s favorite memory from W&J baseball is participating in the DIII World Series. He enjoys being on the teams and the friendships he has formed with his
teammates on and off of the field. Although this year’s spring season may be in question due to COVID-19, the team has put in countless hours of work in the fall season preparing. Drake has high expectations for his teammates and their season, “The team is going to give it all and do the best we can to succeed. Since we’ve had great success in the recent past, we expect to carry that momentum into another season.” Drake and his fellow President teammates will continue to prepare as if this was a normal year. They expect that to be a huge benefit if the season does come to be.
