FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – The Nova Southeastern baseball team is on the verge of opening up Fall Ball ahead of the 2020 baseball season. Under the guidance of 10th-year head coach Greg Brown, the Sharks welcome 16 newcomers to the program, including nine freshman and seven transfers – in addition to 23 Sharks returning to the roster.

Of the Sharks' newcomers, 11 represent the Sunshine State, while NSU welcomes a pair from Canada, as well as one apiece from Arizona, Washington and New Jersey. The 2019 Fall roster wraps up individual workouts and kicks off team practices on Oct. 1.

Jarrett Bond joins the Sharks as a freshman out of Westminster Christian School in Miami. He struck out 97 hitters in 77.1 innings from 2017-19, allowing just 55 hits and posting a 2.90 ERA. Bond was named to HSBN's All-District team in 2018 and Senior All-Star Private Team in 2019. He is the Sharks' first WCS alum since Julian Loret de Mola, an integral part of the rotation of the 2016 NSU National Championship team.

Jacob Bove and Lucas Reid both come to South Florida after single seasons at Sacramento City College, albeit one year apart. Reid, a native of Olympia, Wash. and graduate of Timberline High School in nearby Lacey, first appeared in nine games, with a 4.50 ERA in 13.1 innings, at Mount Vernon's Skagit Valley College in 2017, and followed that up with an impressive 1.42 ERA in 38 innings while striking out 38 and collecting four saves in 19 games at Sac City the following year. At NSU, Reid will reunite with fellow former SCC pitcher Matt Ornelas and pitching coach Bo Henning. Bove, meanwhile, missed the trio by a year. After a four-year varsity career at Higley High School in Gilbert, Ariz., where he earned MVP honors with a .430 batting average and 2.10 ERA, Bove spent the 2017 season at nearby Chandler-Gilbert Community College, holding a 4.31 ERA in 31.1 innings, but injuries forced him to miss the next season and make just two appearances for the SCC Panthers last year.

Local product Jeremy Cook comes to the Sharks from the University of Miami, the latest member of the Hurricane-to-Shark pipeline that has proved very beneficial, resulting in recent talent, including fellow pitchers Devin Meyer (2017-19) and Derik Beauprez (2017-18), as well as 2016 National Champion Sebastian Diaz and 2015 SSC Champion Alexander Fernandez. In Coral Gables, the southpaw accumulated 24 strikeouts in 32 innings across 37 appearances, with an ERA of 4.78. A Weston native, Cook played his high school ball at Flanagan in Pembroke Pines, which has also produced some important players for the Sharks, including teammate Alex Hernandez, 2016 National Champion Andres Visbal, and most notably, three-time MLB All-Star, 2018 World Series Champion, and one of the best all-around hitters in the game, J.D. Martinez. Cook had a record of 13-3, 134 strikeouts and a 2.09 ERA in over 100 high school innings and was named to All-County teams by both the Sun-Sentinel and Miami Herald, among a multitude of other honors.

Tyler Epstein and Stephen Schissler, meanwhile, are both freshmen out of Flanagan. Epstein hit .335 and stole 36 bases between his junior and senior years and was named as the HSBN All-District Team shortstop after both seasons, as well as their Second Team All-American in 2018 and Miami Herald All-County First Team this year. Schissler, on the other hand, is a two-way player in the vein of 2019 SSC Freshman of the Year Duncan Pastore. As a senior at the plate, he hit .310 and slugged .576 with 11 extra-base hits, including four home runs, and also struck out 63 hitters in 51.1 innings with a 2.18 ERA on the mound. He was named District Player of the Year and First Team All-American utility player by HSBN, in addition to First Team All-County by the Herald.

Adan Fernandez continues the other half of the Miami Division I program pipeline to NSU, transferring from Florida International, from whom the Sharks previously received 2016 National Champion and the program's former home run record holder, Brandon Gomez. Fernandez started 78-of-94 games in his two years at FIU under head coach Mervyl Melendez, hitting .225 with 15 home runs and a .418 slugging percentage. In high school, alongside current teammate Johnny Leone and former Sharks Christian Demby and current home run record holder Jake Anchia, Fernandez was part of the powerhouse at Archbishop McCarthy, winning three State titles along the way. He combined for 38 extra-base hits and 58 runs batted in (23 doubles, four triples and 11 home runs) between his junior and senior years, with a .394 average and .782 slugging percentage under coaches Rich Bielski and former Major Leaguer Alex Fernandez - father of former Shark Alexander Fernandez. He was named to HSBN's All-American First Team in both 2016 and 2017 and was also named First Team All-County by both the Miami Herald and the Sun-Sentinel in 2017.

Another Weston native, Marvin Guzman transfers from Seminole State College in Sanford, Fla., where he struck out 55 batters in 42.1 innings. He is the son of former Major Leaguer Juan Guzman, who won back-to-back World Series titles with the Toronto Blue Jays in 1992 and 1993 as part of a 10-year career. In 1991, the elder Guzman finished runner-up for the AL Rookie of the Year award to Chuck Knoblauch, then was an All-Star in 1992 and seventh in the Cy Young race in 1993 from the front of the rotation, with ERAs of 1.71 and 2.88 during the postseasons of their two championship runs. Guzman attended Cypress Bay High School, where he played both baseball, under the late Paul Liotti, and basketball, under former NSU player Jason Looky. He is the Sharks' first alum of the Cypress Bay Lightning program since Zac Westcott, who is currently with the Ottawa Champions of the Can-Am League.

Freshman outfielder Bryce Hazzard comes to the Sharks out of Bloomingdale High School in Valrico, Fla., just outside of Tampa. The switch-hitter played his first two years there with fellow Sharks outfielder Nathan Chevalier, hitting .360 as a senior to earn recognition on the All-813 team, and .305 with 90 hits throughout his high school career.

The Sharks bring in a pair of lefty freshmen in Matt Kavanaugh and Cooper Omans. Kavanaugh is a Broward product, from Coral Springs Charter School, and Omans is a Central Floridian who attended Oviedo High School, where he went 7-1 as a senior with 84 strikeouts and a 1.35 ERA, earning First Team All-Conference honors, following a Second-Team junior season.

Christian Leone and Olivier Mayrand both hail from The Great White North, the program's first Canadian-born players in over 20 years. Leone, a native of Nobleton, Ontario, attended St. Michael's College School in Toronto, while Mayrand is a Québécois from College Laval, right near Montreal.

After being named to Collegiate Baseball's Division I Freshman All-American team for his exceptional season at Fairleigh Dickinson in northern New Jersey, Salvatore Monticciolo joins the Sharks with three years of eligibility remaining. He hit .305, slugged .568, and drove in 46 runs on 11 doubles and 13 home runs, earning the Northeast Conference's Rookie of the Year award in the process. At Holmdel High School, the Monmouth County-based Garden Stater hit .529 and was named a Perfect Game Underclass All-American in 2016.

Raymond Sanchez played two seasons at Palm Beach State, the same junior college that sent the Sharks both 2016 National Champion and 2017 Arizona Diamondbacks draftee Jancarlos Cintron and 2019 Seattle Mariners draftee Brock Minich. In his first season, the lefty hit .284 in 34 games, followed by .272 with eight doubles and seven home runs as a sophomore, after eight total extra-base hits in his freshman season. He attended Forest Hill High School in West Palm Beach, where he was named to the 2016 All-District team with a .367 batting average.

Outfielder Michael Uz hit over .400 as both a sophomore and junior at Westland Hialeah Senior High, with totals of 130 hits, 29 doubles, 11 triples, 90 runs scored, a .380/.439/.556, and a nearly-perfect 34-for-35 on stolen base attempts throughout his high school career. The Pembroke Pines native made three HSBN All-District teams and All-American teams.

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