Forest Park sophomore Felix Quevedo looks to bare-hand a slow roller to third base during practice Tuesday afternoon. Quevedo is one of 15 players listed on the Trojans’ roster after the school district added both baseball and softball to its slate of sports offerings starting this spring. (Dennis Mansfield/Daily News photo)

CRYSTAL FALLS — While spring hasn’t exactly been in the air yet, a new season has nonetheless dawned at Forest Park High School.

This spring marks the start of Trojan baseball and Trojan softball. The Forest Park School Board approved the addition of the two sports on Sept. 27, 2021. The Trojan baseball squad was scheduled to begin its season on Thursday at North Central, while the Lady Trojans softball team is set to start its inaugural campaign on May 11.

With the board’s decision made, the district looked to secure coaches. The board approved the hiring of Mike Larson to coach baseball on Dec. 20, 2021, and then approved the hiring of Kimberly Pekarek this past Monday.

Larson moved to the area two years ago when his wife, Christy, was hired to become the district’s superintendent. Their daughter, Charlie, is on the high school softball team and their son Kade is in the Iron County Little League program.

Coach Larson said his and his son’s love of baseball was the impetus to advance of a Trojans’ team.

Trojan freshman pitcher Kaidince Woollard warms up while inside at a practice Tuesday with a handful of other softball players, while some of her teammates were participating in other sports. Coaches at Forest Park have agreed to allow players to participate in multiple sports so that no one team would be short of participants. (Dennis Mansfield/Daily News sports)

“We worked hard and got a (Little League) team going last year, kind of working with my wife and the school board,” said Larson, who played four years of varsity prep baseball in southwest Wisconsin. “We wanted to try to get baseball going and put it out and there were enough kids that were interested so we got it going.”

This spring, 15 student-athletes joined the baseball team and the names would be familiar to anyone who follows Trojan sports. There are football players and basketball players, and this spring, the baseball team will share athletes with the track team.

While the athletes are well established in those sports, they are newcomers to baseball, Larson said.

“We’re new,” he said. “Just basically like last year with the Little League team I had, I had one boy who’d ever played Little League and that was my son. But I tell you what, the kids (on the high school team) are all willing to learn. What I’ve noticed is we’ve got athletes.”

Now Larson faces the task of molding those athletes into baseball players. That process begins with the basics, like fielding drills.

“Baseball is defense, pitching and catching,” Larson said of his emphasis this spring. “You don’t need to score many runs if you don’t give them any.”

The Forest Park coach said he’s positioned the players after seeing their preseason work, but nothing is set in stone. Adjustments are expected as the games are played, he said.

As the schedule proceeds, Larson wants his players to maintain an optimistic attitude and remember that baseball is a game of failure in some respects.

“Like I told them, ‘One of my favorite quotes is that if major leaguers get three hits in 10 at-bats, that’s seven outs. And they’re still a Hall of Fame player. So don’t get down on yourself.”

Wins can be hard to come by for a beginning program, so the emphasis at Forest Park will be steady improvement.

“Our first year here we want to get the program on solid footing,” Larson said. “I want the kids to enjoy it, I want to see us get better every practice and every game.

“Now wins will come if we do that. And they’re good athletes, they’ll be fine.”

While the baseball team will dive into its schedule quickly, the Lady Trojans’ softball team has time to work on its preparation. With the late hiring of Pekarek, Forest Park was not able to schedule a game until mid-May.

“I didn’t decide to coach until just a couple of weeks ago,” said Pekarek, who graduated from North Dickinson in 2016 but played catcher for Iron Mountain. “I knew I wanted to be a coach, but with this being my first year of teaching (third grade at FP) I wasn’t sure I wanted to take on a big role.”

Nonetheless, the call of family history sounded inside her. Pekarek’s father Ken has been a long-time baseball coach and her brother Kenny played college baseball at Lakeland (Wis.) University. So once she decided to apply for the softball coaching position, Pekarek jumped in with both feet.

“I’m so excited,” she said. “I’m trying to follow in their footsteps.”

Pekarek’s roster this year is comprised of 14 players — six freshmen, four sophomores, two juniors and two seniors. And just like the boys who’ve joined the baseball team, her softball players are multi-sport athletes (see roster below).

“We have a little bit of a background with (softball),” Pekarek said of her players. “Last year, I watched the Little League girls play, so now those girls are freshmen and the freshmen class is very athletic, along with the other girls on the team.”

Pekarek said the district began talking about adding softball in the fall, but there were doubts that it would have enough athletes to support softball along with track and golf. But some of the softball players also compete in those sports, so things worked out.

The team’s first practice was held on April 4 with the opening game set for May 11 against Superior Central in Crystal Falls. While practices so far have been held inside, the players have been enthusiastic.

“All the girls just jumped in,” Pekarek said. “The girls are excited every day. These girls are working so hard, I really couldn’t ask for a better group.”

The practice work has been based on building fundamentals since some of the players have never played the sport before. Pekarek has also stressed conditioning because she wants her team to run the bases well and apply pressure to the defense.

Pekarek said she expects her players to work hard and maintain good attitudes. She added that she is not worried about the win-loss record, focusing instead on building a program that will last.

“Hopefully, they’re having fun so that the underclassmen can see that and continue to come and build this program to what it can be,” she said.

And she wants to pay her love for the sport forward.

“Coaching is in my family’s blood, for sure. I’ve watched my dad coach for years, you know I was that little girl following him to the baseball field. And then watching my older brother coach the teams in the area.

“It’s very important to us and we want to give back to the sport that has given so much to us.”

Jerry DeRoche can be reached at 906-774-2772, ext. 247, or at jderoche@ironmountaindailynews.com.