Terry Pant of Whiteford named Region Baseball Coach of Year

It was something of an embarrassment of riches for Terry Pant this spring.

The Whiteford baseball coach already knew he would have one of the deepest pitching staffs of his 12-year tenure.

Then he learned that Logan Keane, one of the top players from nearby rival Summerfield, had transferred in to join a staff that already included Logan Tammerine, Nate Stevens and Tre Eitniear.

“At our school, we’ve been lucky,” Pant said. “We usually get two good pitchers each year. We had four this year.”

That deep pitching staff led to a deep run in the state tournament for Whiteford, which went farther than any other Monroe County Region schools by making the regional finals.

The Bobcats also set a school record for wins in a season in going 28-8, won their fourth straight district championship and third Tri-County Conference title in a row.

That led to Pant being chosen as Monroe County Region Baseball Coach of the Year in voting by The Monroe News sports staff.

Whiteford’s deep pitching staff rang up 314 strikeouts, easily surpassing the previous school record of 262.

“I don’t know if that will ever be matched,” Pant said of the strikeout record.

Stevens finished with a 9-0 record and received second-team All-State honors, but never threw a pitch in the state tournament.

“The funny thing is that I asked Stevens about it before the season and he said, ‘Coach, I’m your No. 4,’” Pant said. “He pitched consistently well.”

Tammerine threw 68 innings last year, but Pant was able to lower his workload to 54 this spring.

“If someone started to struggle, I had someone else ready to go,” Pant said. “That’s how we won that regional (semifinal) game. I used three guys.”

It didn’t take long for Pant to recognize that this year’s team could be special.

“It came together early on,” he said. “I saw in the first days of practice that we had a great group and we have assistant coaches who could develop these guys. We had a lot of talent, a lot of interchangeable talent.”

Pant credits assistants Nick Guthrie, Andrew Toda, Tom Eitniear, Ty Eitniear and Mike Scott with bringing the best out of the Bobcats.

“I trust all of my assistant coaches,” Pant said. “We have a lot of guys who come in every day and put in their time.”

Pant is so confident in his assistants that he doesn’t coach third base during games like most head coaches. Guthrie gets that responsibility.

“Nick Guthrie is more comfortable giving signs than me,” Pant said. “I did coach third for 12 or 13 games. Guthrie went on vacation and we went on a winning streak. When we lost to Ida I said, ‘You can have it back.’”

A lot of the work went into developing the hitters.

“That was my concern going in,” Pant said. “I knew our defense would be good and we had the pitching. It was what we would do offensively. We had our games where we put up a lot of runs. We seemed to hit better against better pitching. We struggled against weaker pitching.”

In the end, it was offensive issues that ended Whiteford’s season. The Bobcats bowed out of the state tournament with a heartbreaking 12-inning loss to Ann Arbor Greenhills.

“I can’t explain it,” Pant said of the way his hitters struggled that day.

But the one game can’t take the luster off a great season. It appears more success lies ahead for the Bobcats.

Six players who started the regional title game were underclassmen and more talent is on the way.

“Our JV team was 15-5 with mostly freshmen,” Pant said. “It’s been a while since we had a really good JV team.”

Pant, 55, plans to be part of the success for the foreseeable future.

“I have a grandson coming up who could be a really good player,” he said. “He will be in the eighth grade next year. And we’re having fun. I am coaching with a group of buddies who I like.”