This year, Reagan baseball has excelled to break down barriers and reach new goals. With an overall record of 21-7 and a conference record of 8-2, this is the first time the Raiders have ever achieved 20 wins in a season.

Before the season began, the players and coaches set the bar high for themselves.

“Our goals were to win the regular season conference championship and make a deep run in the state playoffs,” head coach Gary Nail said. “We did not win the regular season championship, but so far have made a deep run in the state playoffs.”

The two conference losses the Raiders experienced were against Davie. However, the Raiders have made it much farther in the playoffs than the War Eagles, with Davie falling in the third round to South Caldwell, a team that Reagan went on to defeat in the fourth round with a score of 8-0.

Unfortunately, the Raiders fell short in the regional championship. They lost the first two games of a best two out of three game series to Mooresville High School. This is the first time the baseball team has reached this level of the playoffs in school history.

The team has worked cohesively all season to achieve this amount of success.

“This year we have a close group of guys who are all willing to put in the work to get the results on the field,” sophomore pitcher Josh Hartle said.

Overcoming challenges throughout the season to reach tough goals can be hard; however, the roster is full of star performers.

“Josh Hartle, [juniors] Danny Beal, Chris (CJ) Boyd and [senior] Will Rice have been great on the mound for us,” Nail said. “[Junior] Trevor Faulkner and Boyd have led the way offensively for us.”

Many of the players on the team have committed to further their baseball and educational careers in college. Hartle is committed to Wake Forest, Beal and Boyd to ECU, freshman Carter Boyd to University of Florida. Two seniors have signed to colleges this year: senior Brendan Williamson is signed to Montreal College and senior Nick Leonard is signed to Coker College. Senior David Asbill had signed to Winston Salem State University before their baseball program was disbanded.

Reagan baseball was also ranked tenth by USA TODAY High School Sports for their Super 25 Regional Rankings  in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic region on May 20.

The high success rate of the team has brought out widespread support from students to watch the baseball games and support the Raiders along their journey in playoffs, even at away games.

“Supporting the team this year has been awesome,” senior Wilson Alexander said. “All of the boys have worked so hard all year since the beginning of school, and it has been really cool to see their hard work pay off. My favorite game this year was the game at Myers Park. It was awesome to see the team come together and beat a really talented baseball team.”

Despite not achieving the ultimate goal of a state championship this year, it is obvious the team worked hard to advance to new heights.

“I absolutely love coaching this group of guys,” Nail said. “They work hard everyday and they truly care about each other.”