Marshall Baseball Preview
By Anthony Doria, FM88 Sports
Dec. 11, 2025
HUNTINGTON, W. Va. (WMUL-FM) —The 2025-26 baseball season will be around sooner rather than later, and when Marshall baseball returns from winter break, it will be time to officially start practice for the season.
Head Baseball Coach Greg Beals said that fall ball went well for the team from the hitting and pitching sides.
“We wrapped up fall ball, which then rolls right into recruiting,” Beals said. “We finished up our off-season training in the batting cage for the hitters… Just really making any and all adjustments that we wanted to make from fall ball going into the season… Saw some really good improvements from some guys.”
“From the pitching side, we took November and they didn’t throw, but we did a lot of stuff without their arm, a lot of movement training.” Beals continued. “We just started their throwing program, build back up for the season.”
Marshall added 7 new recruits for next years class.
Beals said he was happy with it as they addressed the traits that Beals has emphasized since taking the job in 2022.
“We announced a recruiting class of this year’s seniors that’ll be next year’s freshmen, got a really good group of guys in there, really emphasized some speed. We’ve got some guys that can really run, bring some speed to our ball club and a couple of pitchers that will continue to add to the depth of our pitching staff.”
When Beals first took the job in 2022, his goal was to get the team to a competitive level with transfers. With his extension and Jack Cook field, he says they can focus on building through high schoolers.
“I think when I first got here, it was about building our team to give us the best opportunity to win…now that we’ve got Jack Cook Field and we’re able to show that, it allows us to recruit a different player, more so meaning more high school players…That’s been a real shot in the arm for our recruiting.”
“We wanna build the program around high school players. We continue to have success though, and the success we had last year, we’ve become more attractive. Our conference is already attractive from a baseball player standpoint, being in the Sun Belt and being primarily a southern conference. So that’s gonna lend us a few more opportunities in the transfer portal. So again, we’re gonna be primarily in the high school”
“I think some opportunities are gonna open up a little bit for the portal too, And we’ll be ready to take advantage of that and make sure that we’re getting the right player that fits into our program and complements what’s already here.”
Marshall’s 2025-26 schedule recently got announced. Beals said that while it is tough, it is built to help them clinch a postseason birth.
“It’s a tough schedule, and really what we did is we put together a schedule that is gonna create a strength of schedule, an RPI strength of schedule, that given we win our share of games, that’s gonna drive our strength of schedule, combined with some wins is gonna drive our RPI ranking.”
“My ultimate goal for our program is that we’re playing in a national tournament. I want this baseball program to be representing Marshall University in a national tournament, and your RPI ranking is a critical piece of that.”
When Beals first took the job, he said his goal was for the team to qualify for the tournament. He said it would be the benefactor of all the work that has gone into this program.
“It would validate a lot of work that’s happened here. And when I talk about work, a lot of that work has nothing to do with the baseball field and what this team’s doing on the baseball field. It has to do with the fundraising, the politics, all the things, and all the people that have been involved … There’s been a ton of work to that, and it would validate that.
“I take this seriously…I love this place. I got to be a part of building this ballpark and building this clubhouse, this Alex Lawrence Clubhouse, and now building the program. I see that as an obtainable goal and something that’ll be, when we get there, a great day for a lot of people.”
It will be full steam ahead when Marshall returns in January before there season starts in February with the Kennesaw State Tournament.