Photo by Erin Nelson.
The Cavaliers greet Luke Harris at home plate after Harris hit a home run in game three of a first-round playoff series for Class 5A against Alexandria at John Carroll Catholic High School on April 26. The Cavaliers fell to Alexandria 6-3 to end their 2021 season.
The success of this year’s John Carroll Catholic High School baseball team was the perfect culmination of four years of hard work.
When Jared Bonvillain took over as the Cavaliers baseball coach, he inherited a group of freshmen with promise, a group eager to make a lasting contribution to the program.
“They wanted to be the group that finally got the team back and the program back to where we wanted to be, where we could start growing substantially on top of it,” Bonvillain said.
Those guys went to work under “Coach Bo.” There were some tough seasons in 2018 and 2019, followed by a 2020 season in which the Cavs likely would have made the playoffs if not for the season being canceled.
But in 2021, it all came together. John Carroll won its area and hosted a Class 5A first round playoff series against Alexandria. The two teams split one-run games in the first two games of the series, and Alexandria won the decisive third game of the series to end the Cavs’ season.
“Any time you go to the playoffs, it pretty much solidifies you as one of the better teams in the state,’ Bonvillain said. “It speaks volumes to what you’ve done in years past and what it’s going to do for you in the future.”
This season has set a new bar for the program.
“This has been laid now,” Bonvillain said. “It’s OK for you to think that we’re going to go to the playoffs now because we have shown that ability. This team has the expectation for teams moving forward. It doesn’t change your approach, but it gives people and your players the understanding that this is the expectation now.”
From that senior class, three of them are heading to play college baseball. JT Weisberg is headed to Birmingham-Southern, Luke Harris will play at Spring Hill, and Mitchell Walker is set to attend Huntingdon.
Weisberg started at John Carroll for four years and was one of the team’s leaders from about the time he was a sophomore. He will play for his dad Jan at Birmingham-Southern.
“He’s like another coach on the field. That’s really one of the best things I could say about him,” Bonvillain said.
Walker started for the Cavs for three years and was considered an emotional leader for the team. As a pitcher, he amassed 17 wins over his varsity career.
“That’s averaging six wins on the mound every year. For a guy that really doesn’t light up the radar gun, he knows he has to work hard on his offspeed stuff. He keeps guys off balance. He’s a very smart player,” Bonvillain said about him.
Harris is the second player in as many years to go to Spring Hill by way of John Carroll, as he follows in the footsteps of TJ Messina from a year ago. Spring Hill also happens to be Bonvillain’s alma mater.
Harris battled injuries through much of his career but never let it stop him.
“When he came out in the spring, it was like he had never missed a step. When the other players saw that, they saw that as an example they wanted to follow,” Bonvillain said.
Bonvillain said he had a fun team to coach this year and was proud of how the players bonded.
“They learned over the last four years to motivate each other and serve each other,” he said. But the thing I’m most proud of is they learned how to love each other.”
