Last summer the Powell Pioneers captured their first state championship since 2010, and the team is primed and ready to defend that crown after returning nearly the entire lineup from a year ago.

Powell returns four All-State selections, including the returning ‘A’ Player of the Year in Cade Queen and the ‘A’ Pitcher of the Year in Brock Johnson alongside Jhett Schwahn and Trey Stenerson.

Powell also returns second team ‘A’ West All-Conference selection Jacob Gibson to the mound this season.

Pitching will be solid once again this season, as the Pioneers return a lineup that pitched nearly every inning last year and had a cumulative 2.76 ERA alongside a total of 464 strikeouts as a team.

“The pitchers are going to be the strength of our team again like they have the last couple of years,” manager Jason Borders said.

The two positions they need to replace are Ryan Cordes in left field alongside Aidan Wantulok, who was a rotational second baseman and right fielder.

“We’ve got some guys I think can step up,” Borders said. “Those were two good baseball players and we’re going to miss them. We miss their energy, but we missed their maturity at regionals. These guys now are a year older … The younger guys are a year older (too), this is just a mature team with nine seniors.”

With such a strong returning cast the Pioneers also bring back a large majority of their runs scored from a year ago, as they are geared for another run at the title, this time with the opportunity to win it in front of their home crowd at the end of July.

The road to that state tournament will be a long journey, kicking off this weekend in Sheridan, where the Pioneers claimed that title a year ago.

Powell will be taking on the ‘AA’ Sheridan Troopers, a team the Pioneers played several times last year and which was the top team in ‘AA’ before being upset at the state tournament.

That series was originally set for Saturday afternoon, but has been moved up to Friday evening at 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. due to weather forecasted for Saturday.

“We just need to knock the cobwebs off,” Borders said. “Sheridan is always good and gives us a battle. I think we’ll be fine.”

It will not be an easy road for the Pioneers.

Borders said he will be testing the team even more than a year ago with challenges coming against difficult Montana opponents, the ‘AA’ Kirby Drube Memorial Tournament in Gillette at the end of May, tournaments in Montana and Green River in June alongside conference games before a ‘AA’ tournament over the Fourth of July, more conference games and another matchup with the Troopers.

“The schedule is not going to be easy. There’s going to be some bumps — we probably aren’t going to go 40-20 like we did last year,” Borders said.

That will lead to districts in Green River, before the Pioneers return home to compete. They don’t need to worry about qualifying to defend their title as the host city receives an automatic bid to the state tournament.

Borders feels his team is up for the challenge of being defending state champs. After all, four of his players were involved in winning a basketball state title.

“I felt like once we got past May into June I felt like we had a target (last year), we were ranked No. 1 most of the year and I felt like a lot of teams were coming at us with their best guys,” Borders said. “They just went undefeated in basketball and they know the pressure of what’s to come I think.”