Lane Deaver, a 2013 Grafton High graduate, recently finished off a successful freshman regular season for Ferrum College’s baseball team.
Deaver, a first team all-Bay Rivers District outfielder for the Clippers last spring, made 17 starts for Ferrum this season and batted .350 with seven RBI to help the Panthers claim their ninth USA South conference title in school history.
At Grafton, Deaver was a two-year starter his junior and senior seasons who batted .367 with a .451 on base percentage. He raked seven doubles and drove in 21 runs as one of the Clippers’ top run producers.
While pleased with the numbers he posted this season as a freshman at Ferrum, Deaver said he was most proud of how hard he had to work to become an everyday player.
He was recruited by former Ferrum skipper Darren Hodges, who resigned last year after four seasons heading the program. The first time Deaver met the Panthers new coach, Ryan Brittle, was last July — a month before classes started — when Brittle came to watch the Virginia High School Coaches Association East vs. West All-Star game at War Memorial Stadium in Hampton.
“That was the first time I had ever seen or talked to him,” Deaver said of Brittle, who joined Ferrum after four years as an assistant at Rogers State University in Hampton. “He told me that nobody was going to be guaranteed a spot and would have to work for playing time.”
Deaver accepted the challenge and, in addition to starting two-thirds of Ferrum’s games this season, went on to be named a two-time USA South Athletic Conference Rookie of the Week during the month of April.
“Coming in, I just wanted to work as hard as I could to get on the field,” Deaver said. “Once I got that opportunity I didn’t want to lose it and just tried to play baseball. I was glad I was able to do that.”
Since Ferrum lost two of three regular-season matchups against co-conference champion Covenant College, who is guaranteed a spot in the NCAA Division III playoffs, that leaves the Panthers’ postseason fate in the hands of the selection committee, which will select the rest of the field next week.
