In his second season with the Friends University baseball program, interim head baseball coach Derek Leppert will bring a lot to the table for the upcoming season. But he is most excited about what the players will contribute talent-wise.

“This is the deepest team I’ve ever been a part of,” Leppert said.

Out of 48 Friends players, 40 have a legitimate chance at playing varsity this spring, he said. What’s more, 30 to 35 guys are playing at such a level that they could be starters at other schools in the Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference.

The former head coach, Matt Cloud, is gone from the program as of November. Leppert then moved from assistant to head coach, and the team’s foundation doesn’t seem to be shaken.

“It’s the players, not the coaches, that make the team,” Leppert said.

In the next couple of weeks Leppert will make some tough decisions regarding who will play, he said.

Because of the sheer quantity of talented players, Leppert is most worried about finding enough playing time for them, which boils down to getting enough at-bats for everybody, he said.

Friends will look at two potential recruits to transfer in at semester: a right-handed pitcher from Wichita State University and a right-handed hitter from Kansas State University.

Leppert foresees Friends’ standouts to include sophomore pitcher Jeremy Sirios, he said. His mental list also includes senior pitcher Matt Braumberger, senior catcher/pitcher Nate Nordstrom, junior pitcher Nick Guana and junior shortstop Austin Stading.

Senior Steve Shaw will make the move from outfield to third base; junior Joe Thibault will also make a position change to first base. Both Shaw and Thibault are potential standouts.

Starting pitcher Josh Tucker will also be a standout if he stays, Leppert said.

But Tucker said he can’t see himself staying at Friends. As of now, Tucker is 95 percent sure he is leaving, but said he is the only one.

Tucker’s main consideration for transferring to Bellevue University in Nebraska has been the fact that Cloud is no longer the head coach at Friends.

Cloud was more like a father figure away from home to Tucker, and therefore more than just a coach, he said. But Cloud did push him to the next level as a player.

Tucker said Cloud turned the whole program around at Iowa Wesleyan College. And when Cloud came to Friends, 28 out of the 32 players asked to go with him, but he couldn’t bring them all, Tucker said. Only six, including Tucker, transferred.

Tucker said Cloud led the Friends crew to one game shy of winning the conference and a third place finish in regionals last year. So given his track record, he doesn’t understand why Cloud is no longer with the program.

But transferring still hasn’t been easy to consider. Leaving Friends after playing one season also means leaving his best friend since kindergarten, Sean Zuniga. The pair played high school ball in Arizona and after one year of college, Zuniga transferred to Iowa Wesleyan, and the two have been playing together since.

Tucker hopes the reputation Bellevue has of pitchers being drafted out of its program and the consistency of a coach that has been around since 1989 will add some stability to his aspirations.

Even as the team stands now, Friends has been ranked 32nd in the nation in the preseason poll.

It is the team, not the coaches, that made the rankings, Leppert said.

Leppert said the team is strong in the outfield this year, but also has strengths in pitching and up the middle. The team will look to improve the most defensively through repetition and a lot of ground balls at practices.

And the team’s sights are set high.

The Falcons expect to win conference, regionals and advance to the World Series, Leppert said. Those were goals that were set back in September, and those goals haven’t changed.