Editors note: The following story has been edited for clarity

Last week, two players from the Palomar College baseball team won the California Community College Baseball Coaches Association Southern California Athletes of the week award for their performance on the field.

Sophomore Jack Sanders led the Comets by racking up hits against Imperial Valley College on Tuesday, March 9 and Thursday, March 11. During the game on Tuesday, Sanders went 3-5 including a single in the fifth inning extending the lead to 4-2. But nothing seemed to stop him from continuing to demolish pitches up at the plate as he hit two home runs on Thursday helping the Comets sweep Imperial Valley College.

In addition, sophomore Kyle Carr has been holding the fort down for the Comets as he pitched through six innings against San Diego City College on Friday, March 3. Throughout his outing, he recorded ten strikeouts and gave up two hits including a solo home run.

Throughout Sanders’ career, he has been able to motivate himself by “keeping my mind at a calm place and going to the gym as much as I can.”

Sanders’ passion for baseball started when he was little and wants to continue playing his best. “Baseball has been something that I’ve fallen in love with and enjoyed doing, and want to keep going for as long as I can,” said Sanders.

As mentioned, Sanders went 3-5 and 4-4 while playing against Imperial Valley. His reaction was “ It was cool, hopefully I can continue doing what I can do.” “It was cool, hopefully, I can continue doing what I can do.”

While talking to Carr, he mentioned how his fascination with baseball began, “just playing at a young age and fell in love with the sport and the competitiveness of baseball made me love it more than other sports.”

In January, Carr committed to Texas Christian University allowing him to pursue baseball in the future.

“I was extremely excited and it’s a lot of weight off my shoulders now that I have a school that I could go to and during the season, I could focus on playing baseball instead of school,” said Carr. His advice to teammates that are trying to get recruited to a four year college is “Just keep on doing your own thing and don’t worry about other players, some people could have better success than you, but just put your head down and worry about yourself.”

As stated, Carr pitched through the sixth inning while playing against the Knights. His reaction was, “it felt really good, I remember giving up a home run to one of my best friends, but after that, I was able to lock in and finish the game on a strong note.”

Outfield coach, Chase Grant described how the team has changed significantly from last season. “Every team is going to be different each year, but something that stands out this year compared to last year is that we have more depth with our players and we obviously have a lot of talented guys that bring energy to our games,” said Grant.

After Carr’s outing, Grant’s reaction was, “that’s kinda what he does as a player so it was nothing that we didn’t expect out of him, and will give us 100 percent every single time.”

“Sanders works really hard and does a lot of stuff outside of just practice so to see him succeed and watch everything come together for him is awesome to see,” said Grant