Zach Smith Strikes a Silver Medal in Baseball

In November 2019, one of our current Year 9 students, Zach Smith, was approached by the New Zealand Under 15 Baseball coach who asked him to play for New Zealand at the upcoming Under 15 Baseball World Cup Qualifier in January this year. The Oceania Qualifier originally had teams from CNMI, Fiji, Taipei and Guam, however Fiji and Taipei pulled out so only Guam, CNMI and New Zealand remained in the competition. Guam took it to New Zealand in the opening match and managed to get the win, but this only ignited the fire in the New Zealand team. New Zealand only lost one more match and had a win loss record of 4 wins – 2 losses, for the week, before heading into the Championship game. Zach and his New Zealand teammates threw everything they had at Guam defensively but unfortunately could not get the runs needed, and ended up walking away with a silver medal.

Upon his return from the tournament, Zach discovered that he had been selected to play for Australia and will be under the guidance of former Major League Baseball players Trent Oeltjen and Ryan Rowland-Smit. Zach will train with the team, and then travel to Los Angeles in June/July this year to compete in the USSSA tournament, where he had previously won the Golden Glove award last year for the tour.

Congratulations Zach on your outstanding success!