On November 18th, senior baseball player Ryan Donley signed his National Letter of Intent to play Division 1 baseball at Oakland University in Auburn Hills, Michigan. He plans to major in Business in addition to pitching for the school.

     During his time as a varsity baseball player, Donley was named the Chesterton High School MVP, and earned All-Conference Honors in the DAC. His senior season of baseball will begin after spring break.  Donley originally announced his commitment to the school at the beginning of the second semester last year. 

     “The process took a good 2 months for me to realize it was the right fit.” Donley was one of the first in this year’s senior class to commit, sharing his decision in the middle of his junior year. 

Although the commitment process itself was difficult, Donley’s choice wasn’t hard to make. He concluded, “It was pretty difficult, lots of emails sent to coaches, it just took a lot of time. I would say the deciding factor was the coaches always checking in on me and making me feel welcome.”

At the beginning of Donley’s recruitment process, there weren’t many other schools actively having discussions with him. He said, “Honestly I was just talking to Oakland at the time so they were the only school.” 

Donley is proud of his accomplishments, and looks forward to the future, saying, “ “It definitely feels good [to be a college athlete], I just know I have a lot of work left, and I can’t get lazy now.”

The Sandscript wishes Ryan Donley good luck as he goes into his college career and into his senior season of baseball!