University of Evansville baseball coach Wes Carroll added a pair of talented catchers to his 2010 roster on Monday, as Center Grove High School catcher Chris Pearson (Greenwood, Ind.) and Barrington, Illinois talent John Day (Barrington High School) both signed National Letters of Intent to continue their baseball careers at UE.

“We are really excited to be able to bring in two players the caliber of Chris and John during the summer recruiting season,” said Carroll.  “Both guys are not only tremendous baseball players, but also very good character players who will add a lot to our program both on and off of the field.

“Chris is coming off of an outstanding senior season at Center Grove High School and is a very polished catcher behind home plate.  John is more of a raw athlete, but he is someone who is very versatile and can not only play catcher, but can also play a corner outfield position.  With Andrew Gher graduating and Andy Pascoe likely moving out from behind home plate, we needed to add depth at catcher during the off-season, and both Chris and John help fill that void.”

Pearson recently helped Center Grove High School to a sectional championship, while ranking among the state’s leaders in hitting.  In Indiana’s most recent statistical update through the end of May, Pearson ranked among Indiana’s leaders in batting average (.452), doubles (nine), and hits (42), after maintaining a batting average above .600 for most of the early part of the season.  Pearson has been ranked among the top 25 players in the state of Indiana by the Prep Baseball Report, and earned honorable mention all-state honors in 2007 and all-county and all-metro honors behind the dish in 2008.

Day also recently helped his Barrington High School team to a regional and sectional championship in Illinois.  He hit a key solo home run in Barrington’s sectional semifinal victory over Libertyville last week, and scored the game-winning run in the team’s 2-1 victory over Prospect in the regional championship game.  Day, who has split time between centerfield and catcher during his high school career at Barrington, was ranked among the top players in the Chicagoland area by both the Chicago Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune during the pre-season, while also ranking in Prep Baseball Report’s top 70 players for the state of Illinois.

Pearson and Day will join fall signees Scott Scheumann (Ft. Wayne, Ind./Bishop Dwenger), Josh Biggs (Valparaiso, Ind./Washington Township), Kyle Lloyd (Carmel, Ind./Carmel), Adam Culiver (Newburgh, Ind./Castle), Jake Naumann (Naperville, Ill./North), Ryan Pierce (Jeffersonville, Ind./Jeffersonville) and Ryan Oesterle (Peoria, Ariz./Scottsdale C.C.) in Carroll’s first recruiting class as head coach of the Purple Aces.  Carroll recently guided UE to a 25-30 overall record in his first year as head coach, with the 25 victories ranking as the second-highest victory total by a first-year baseball coach in UE history.  Evansville will return 20 players from this year’s squad next spring, including all-Missouri Valley Conference picks Cody Fick, Andy Pascoe, and Tom Heithoff.