After one and a half months of walk-on tryouts, professional scout practices and intersquad scrimmages, the NIU baseball team can rest easy.

That is, the finalized baseball team.

Head coach Joe “Spanky” McFarland closed out the fall campaign by making his final roster cuts of the season this past weekend. McFarland released 10 players from the squad, decreasing the number of players to 32, six of who are expected to be redshirted, assistant coach Pete Tsotsos said.

“We can travel with 25 guys,” explained Tsotsos, “but we can carry as many as we like. For now we’ll keep the number that we have and go from there. The end result is that we have our team for the season.”

The ten players released were a mixture of walk-ons as well as players returning from last season’s squad. Tsotsos found it harder for the coaching staff to cut the returning players because of loyalty.

“The guys from last year are all real good kids and they all worked hard, both this season and last,” said Tsotsos. “But the program is moving to a new level and we have to be able to go forward with the flow. We’re really starting to develop into a good ball club.”

The cuts were made after six walk-ons were kept and 15 new recruits joined the team earlier this fall. After a month of intersquad scrimmages every afternoon, the coaching staff was able to make the choices they feel will benefit a team that went 11-25 last season after an 0-18 start. The batch of new faces on the diamond should be a boost to the program.

“The mix of guys from last year and the new guys we brought in this year should make for a great team,” said Tsotsos. “We’ve got a nice combination of experience and talent.

“We’re excited about getting the season underway and see what we can do. Granted, we’ll be facing a much more difficult schedule, so it works both ways.”

The spring season begins on March 6 when the Huskies’ travel south for their spring trip.