ARTHUR - Adam Carver, a 2009 graduate of Arthur High School who played baseball for Arthur-Lovington and is a recent graduate of Kaskaskia College, is to continue his baseball career at the 2010 Division II National champion Screaming Eagles of the University of Southern Indiana in Evansville.

Carver, a southpaw, earned the Pitcher of the Year award at Kaskaskia under coach Mitch Koester. Carver was 3-4 with a 3.36 earned run average. In 50 innings he had 47 strikeouts and 30 walks for the 26-19 Blue Devils, who finished 16-15 in the Great Rivers Athletic Conference, good for fifth place.

Carver was named an Academic All-American with a 3.87 grade point average, earning Superior Academic Achievement (3.7 to 3.99; 4.0 was pinnacle award for academic excellence and 3.6-3.69 was Exemplary Academic Achievement).

"Adam had a great year for us on the mound," said Koester. "We knew coming in that he was gong to have to log big innings for us and he did. He had a great year, and USI is not only going to get a good pitcher but a great student."

Carver was also offered a scholarship from South Carolina Upstate and Campbell University in North Carolina. Butler, Quincy, Delta State and Ouachita Baptist University all were interested in Carver.

"Southern Indiana winning the Div. II national championship made it really very attractive," said Carver. "Coach (Tracy) Archuleta and (assistant) coach (Chris Marx) are great people. Coach Marx took me around campus and they are fairly new buildings and Evansville is a great place. There is a lot to do there. It is a good baseball atmosphere. I look to go there and win some games and hopefully after my two years there get drafted. I have an opportunity there to see if I can go and impress. I am going to do my best, that is for sure. I am pretty excited. I can't imagine not playing baseball in college. I have been doing some long tossing the past couple of weeks and hitting the weight room. I am trying to pump my fastball into the low 90s (throws in the mid to upper 80s), and with my change-up in the lower 80s, that would be great."

Carver's pitching coach this year at Kaskaskia was another Arthur grad, Marcus Wilson, a 2005 alumni, who played at Kaskaskia and Delta State.

His freshman year Carver pitched 17 and two-thirds innings and appeared in 12 games for the 21-19 team. It wasn't exactly the freshman year he was hoping for as he was 0-1 with a 13.24 earned run average.

"We had an end of the year meeting and coach Koester said I would just be middle relief next year," said Carver. "That motivated me to work hard last summer and figure things out so I could be a starter. I had the highest ERA on the team and that was embarrassing. I knew I was better than that. I came home that summer and Mr. Wilson (Travis) got me together with Bert Bradley (San Francisco Giants minor league pitching coordinator and Cumberland grad). He just fixed one little mechanical thing in one day. I pitched well in the summer in Legion ball and had a good fall throwing hard and hitting my spots. Hitting spots was the key. I didn't locate very well before. The change-up was the main pitch that led to my success. In high school I never really had one that was accurate. Throwing a fastball and then a change-up got them on their front foot and I got a lot of ground balls. Something had to change and luckily I had the people there to support me. Luckily, I had a good spring."

Carver played for the Moultrie Douglas American Legion teams in 2006-2010 and earned first-team all-Little Okaw Valley Conference status, earning MVP honors his junior year for the 4-21 Knights going 2-4 on the mound with 65 strikeouts in 10 games. As a sophomore Carver was 3-1 for Arthur, which went 12-16 overall and 9-8 in the LOVC. His senior year he had a 2.46 earned run average for the 5-16 team.

Southern Indiana has an enrollment of 10, 702 students and competes in the Great Lakes Valley Conference, a 15-team conference.

"I am very excited to work with Adam over the next two years," said Archuleta. "We look for him to make an impact on our staff immediately."

A strong support staff has helped Carver, who is an assisstant coach for Moultrie Douglas' senior legion team, be where he is today.

"Both Mr. Wilson and Marcus Wilson helped out a lot and Bert Bradley too," said Carver, who is to major in biology with an emphasis on physical therapy. "Mr. Wilson (Carver's Legion coach) pushed me to do the right things. He would light a fire under me and my dad (Steve) was always helping me in the back yard, catching me when I needed it. My parents (Steve Carver and Cheryl Ryan) would do anything for me for baseball. Not all parents are like that. It is nice to have that. I think they would probably lose their jobs to have me keep playing baseball. It is cool to have Cheryl and Steve there for me."

The team is to return nine pitchers, including one southpaw, after losing seven pitchers, including one southpaw.

"Adam has great command and will be expected to compete for a spot in the starting rotation," said Archuleta, who is the winningest coach in the history of the program at USI with 207 wins in just five years (207-95, including 119-42 in the GLVC. Archuleta is 355-219 in 10 years, having coached the University of Wisconsin-Parkside for five years. The 2010 team went 52-14 and Archuleta was named the ABCA NCAA II Coach of the Year. In five years the program has sent eight players into professional baseball.

"Coach Archuletta saw me pitch against John A. Logan on a day that it was 35 degrees and windy," said Carver, who was also seen by Archuleta at a showcase at Saint Joseph's College in Rensselaer, Ind. "They told me right off I had a chance had being a starter and obviously that helps when you hear that from a program like that. That played into my decision to go there."

Contact Mike Monahan at mmonahan@jg-tc.com or 238-6854.