by Scott Sacry
The Bitterroot Bucs have had a great 2023 Legion season so far. They are in 2nd place in the West A district with a 10-3 conference record and a 23-5 overall record. The Bucs are coached by Austin Nogle, who has been the Bucs’ manager since 2018. Nogle has been involved with the Bucs since 2010 when he was a player.
“We have had a good season so far,” said Nogle. “We take it one day at a time. We have had some success, but we try to be more about the process, and not the result.”
The Bucs team is made up of Bitterroot Valley kids north of Bell Crossing. They also have a handful of Missoula kids who help fill out the roster. “This year’s team is kind of split between young and old kids. It’s nice to have that older presence, and it’s nice to see the younger guys stepping up,” said Nogle. “We have an all-hands-on deck mentality. Since we’re the Buccaneers, we’ve used the Pirates of the Caribbean line ‘part of the crew, part of the ship’ as our theme.”
This is the first year of Legion baseball after a high school baseball season, and some wondered how it would affect the Legion season. “For the most part it has been the same as before,” said Nogle. “Maybe the only negative I see is that the players didn’t play many double headers in high school, so they had to adjust a little bit to that. But it was nice that they came in already playing competitive baseball.”
The Legion season culminates in Districts on July 20-23 at Mission Valley. The top two teams at Districts advance to State at Laurel on July 26-30.