Baseball | 6/25/2024 9:58:42 AM
The Empire 8 Conference is celebrating the league’s 25th Anniversary season in 2023-24, honoring student-athletes, teams, coaches and administrators who have played a key role in the league’s success over the last 25 years. Empire 8 Baseball is no exception, as several individuals and teams have excelled at the conference, national and regional levels.
RIT was awarded the first E8 Baseball Championship in 2000 as the top team in the regular season. From there, Ithaca College would win the next nine E8 Championships. St. John Fisher University broke the Ithaca streak by winning back-to-back league titles in 2010 and 2011 before Ithaca ran off eight straight from 2012-19, including the first Empire 8 Championship Tournament to crown a league champion in 2015. The Cardinals have emerged as the current team to beat, winning the last four Empire 8 Championships. Ithaca won 17 titles over, while St. John Fisher has six.
St. John Fisher standout Andy Campbell and Geoff Dornes of RIT are the lone student-athletes to be named three-time Empire 8 Player of the Year. Campbell earned the honors in 2004, 2005 and 2006, while Dornes picked up the accolades in 2007, 2008 and 2010. Campbell, Chris Botsford, Justin D’Amato, Scott Eisenmenger and Justin Graham of St. John Fisher, Dornes, David Ahonen and Sam Little of Ithaca and David Wessells of Houghton University were all four-time All-E8 first team selections.
In 2021, St. John Fisher catcher Adam Zebrowski was named the ABCA/Rawlings and D3baseball.com Division III National Player of the Year after leading the nation with 20 home runs and 70 runs batted in, while hitting .500. Just two years later, Noah Campanelli of St. John Fisher was named the Division III Commissioner’s Association National Men’s Student-Athlete of the Year.
Tim Locastro, who played three seasons at Ithaca from 2011-13, made his Major League Baseball debut with the Los Angeles Dodgers on Sept. 29, 2017, and has played parts of seven seasons in the big leagues with the Arizona Diamondbacks, New York Yankees, and New York Mets.
Former Ithaca head coach George Valesente holds the E8 record with 556 coaching wins in addition to 17 Empire 8 titles and 11 Coach of the Year honors in 20 seasons from 2000-2019. Current St. John Fisher head coach Brandon Potter recently completed his 15th season and has 426 wins and a .687 winning percentage to go along with six Empire 8 Championships and five Coach of the Year honors. Kristaps Aldins of Stevens was a three-time E8 Coach of the Year, while RIT head coach Rob Grow won 235 games in 12 seasons. Former St. John Fisher head coach Dan Pepicelli won 200 games in nine seasons with a pair of E8 Coach of the Year accolades.
Ithaca made a storybook run to the College World Series in 2013, winning seven games in the tournament, while finishing third overall. The Bombers finished 41-8 that season. St. John Fisher won 39 games and advanced to the College World Series in 2016.
Below we are honoring members of the Empire 8 Baseball 25th Anniversary Team. Recipients were chosen by the league office and were named either an Empire 8 Player of the Year, Pitcher of the Year, m ABCA/Rawlings or D3baseball.com All-American or earned All-Empire 8 first team honors at least three times in their collegiate careers.
Empire 8 Baseball 25th Anniversary Team
David Ahonen, 3B, Ithaca
Dan Allen, P/OF, Stevens
Ron Amato, OF, Ithaca
Chris Botsford, 1B, St. John Fisher
Anthony Brophy, P, St. John Fisher
Andy Campbell, 1B/SS, St. John Fisher
Noah Campanelli, 2B, St. John Fisher
Ethan Cetton, P, Houghton
Justin D’Amato, P, St. John Fisher
Alex Detwiler, 1B/OF, Stevens
Geoff Dornes, OF/P, RIT
Emmett Dunn, P, Ithaca
Scott Eisenmenger, 1B, St. John Fisher
Brendan Espinal, OF, Russell Sage
Nick Flemister, C, St. John Fisher
Matt Fuller, U, St. John Fisher
Leo Fusilli, C, St. John Fisher
Bryan Gardner, P, Ithaca
Justin Graham, SS, St. John Fisher
Tucker Healy, P, Ithaca
Steve Karnyski, 1B, St. John Fisher
R.J. Kuruts, P, St. John Fisher
Dan Jurik, P, St. John Fisher
Pat Lemmo, P, Ithaca
Steven Lewis, P, St. John Fisher
Sam Little, OF, Ithaca
Tim Locastro, SS, Ithaca
Pete MacDaniel, P, Ithaca
Patrick McGuire, P, St. John Fisher
Connor McHugh, P, St. John Fisher
Allen Murphy, 1B, St. John Fisher
James Murphy, 3B, St. John Fisher
Brian Norsen, 1B, St. John Fisher
Marty O’Boyle, 2B/DH, Ithaca
Tom O’Connor, P, Ithaca
Geoff Osborne, C, St. John Fisher
Sean Osterman, OF, St. John Fisher
Jeremy Peters, U, St. John Fisher
Bryan Phillips, INF, St. John Fisher
Jon Prendergrast, P, Ithaca
Rob Raux, C, Ithaca
Dylan Rees, P, RIT
Charlie Ruegger, P, Stevens
Nick Sottung, P, Ithaca
Jeremy Tosh, 3B/SS, RIT
David Wessells, OF, Houghton
Kyle Williams, Ithaca
Shane Wolf, DH, Ithaca
Jayson Yano, U, Stevens
Adam Zebrowski, C, St. John Fisher
Founded in 1999, the Empire 8 has developed into one of the premier NCAA Division III athletic conferences, both on the field and in the classroom. The conference has created and implemented innovative and groundbreaking sportsmanship programming over this time, many of our which have received great publicity, including features in USA Today, The Chronicle of Higher Education, The NCAA News, and various athletic profession publications. The Empire 8 has also been highly influential in helping to shape the Division III landscape, passing many legislative proposals along with individuals who hold leadership roles at the national level.
Feature stories and series’ celebrating the league’s 25th anniversary will be highlighted on the conference's website and social media platforms throughout the 2023-24 season, starting in September. The conference will also be using the #E825 and #E8Anniversary hashtags on its Twitter and Instagram platforms as a way for fans to follow along throughout the year.
ABOUT THE EMPIRE 8 CONFERENCE
The members of the Empire 8 Conference are committed first and foremost to the pursuit of academic excellence and the league is regarded as an outstanding NCAA Division III conference. The membership has distinguished itself among its peer group for its quality institutions, spirited and sportsmanlike competition, outstanding services and highly ethical policies and practices. Its commitment to serve the educational needs of its student-athletes is the hallmark of the E8. For more on the Empire 8 visit
www.empire8.com.
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