No Nevada program has won more Mountain West championships than the four claimed by Wolf Pack baseball. As the 2026 season starts, the team has a new goal — win conference titles in back-to-back seasons for the first time in Nevada baseball history.

“It would mean everything,” first-year head coach Jordan Getzelman said of making that kind of history. “I think it would mean that we stuck to the process really well and did the things that we can control. I think that would be special.”

Nevada’s roster is teeming with talent, the Wolf Pack picked to win the MW in the preseason coaches poll. The roster includes five preseason All-MW picks on the 13-player list, including LHP Alessandro Castro, 3B Sean Yamaguchi, C Jake Harvey, 1B/RHP Jayce Dobie and 2B/SS Junhyuk Kwon.

“You’re not going to see this kind of team in a while,” Yamaguchi said. “I thought our last year team was really good. This year’s team is way better. It’s a lot more special.”

Yamaguchi is one of seven returning starters among Nevada position players. A freshman All-American a season ago, Yamaguchi was one of several Wolf Pack stars who opted against entering the transfer portal. After falling short of the 2025 NCAA Tournament, Nevada’s players wanted one more season together after losing in the MW Tournament semifinal to San Jose State.

“With the way it ended last year, I think it left a chip on a lot of our shoulders knowing that we were so close,” Castro said. “We were able to retain a lot of the guys, and we just had that feeling that we want more.”

After earning All-MW honors last season, Castro returns to anchor Nevada’s rotation, which lost two weekend starters. The Wolf Pack is high on some of its transfer pitchers, namely Jordan Giacomini and Aidan Brainard, and last year’s relief ace, Dominic Desch, is in the mix to move to the rotation.

After last year’s regular-season championship, Nevada knows it will be the hunted in 2026.

“I think this year it’s more of a target on our back,” Desch said. “We’ve proved that we can win. Now, it’s gonna be up to us this year to kind of bring our best to every single game, every single conference games, especially with the shorter conference schedule”

Perhaps the biggest question isn’t on the diamond but in the dugout. Jake McKinley, whose three-year build turned Nevada into conference champs, resigned in December to take a job in MLB’s Seattle Mariners. His top assistant, Getzelman, was promoted that same day, just 10 weeks before the season opener, which is Friday at SEC power Ole Miss.

“My mornings are a little busier,” Getzelman admitted. “Being a hitting coach and a head coach, you’re just doing both a little bit. But I’ve really enjoyed it, and I think for me, just leading the team, coming in the locker room, having something to teach them each and every day, it’s been a lot of fun.”

With a roster primed for success, Nevada is dreaming big in 2026 — back-to-back MW regular-season titles, an NCAA Tournament berth and maybe even a trip to the College World Series.

“Us going to Omaha,” Yamaguchi said of this year’s goal. “If the team’s winning, I’m winning. And I think that’s the biggest thing is no one on our team is selfish like that where they care about their overall stats more than the team stats. And you look at last year, we did well because everyone bought in and everyone cared about the team winning. This year, we have a bunch more veterans guys who understand that and they’re going to keep guys in check.”

You can watch our video preview of the Nevada baseball season starting at the top of this page.