St. John's University Athletics
Baseball Program Holds Annual Alumni Reunion
10/16/2008 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
Oct. 16, 2008
QUEENS, N.Y. - The St. John's baseball program held its annual alumni reunion on Oct. 10, featuring an afternoon of golf at North Shore Towers and a reception at the Sly Fox Inn. Nearly 30 golfers took to the course and 60 people attended the reception.
"This year's alumni reunion was once again very successful, said head coach Ed Blankmeyer. "We had an outstanding turnout and it was great to see and talk with all of the former players."
At the reception Blankmeyer discussed the ongoing improvements to Jack Kaiser Stadium, including a newly-constructed entranceway, a new scoreboard and internet capabilities that will allow streaming video for home games on the internet at RedStormSports.com. Blankmeyer also discussed the addition of the BIG EAST-BIG Ten challenge to the schedule for this season.
Attendees included some of the most recent St. John's baseball alumni, including 2008 graduates George Brown, Jeff Grantham and Gil Zayas as well as 2008 draft pick Jared Yecker. At the golf outing Jason Kane was the winner of the longest drive, while James Lally won the closest to the pin challenge. The team of pitching coach Scott Brown, Anthony Sullivan and Lally were winners of the team competition.
"It was great to see the guys that I played with during my career here at St. John's," said Grantham, a member of the St. John's baseball alumni committee headed by former coach Jack Kaiser. "The baseball program was always good to me and I want to remain involved and help in any way possible."
St. John's recorded it fourth-straight 40-win season and won its second-straight BIG EAST regular season title in 2008. The Red Storm (42-16, 20-7) set a new school record for wins, tied a school record for conference wins and reached the NCAA Tournament for the fourth time in the past five years. A school-record tying eight players earned All-BIG EAST honors, while Blankmeyer was named both the ABCA Northeast Region and BIG EAST Coach of the Year for the second straight year and third time in four seasons. The Red Storm peaked at No. 18 in the Baseball America poll, its highest ranking since May of 1981. The squad was ranked No. 29 in the final Collegiate Baseball Newspaper poll and received votes in the final editions of both the ESPN/USA Today and National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association (NCBWA) polls.
