photo by: Emily Stenzel/Hays Larks

Playing for the Hays Larks, Hutch Russell smiles during a game against the Gameday Angels on Wednesday, June 17, 2026, in Hays.

Almost as soon as the college baseball season ends, Kansas baseball players decamp to locations around the country to join summer collegiate leagues.

This year has been no different, although some of the Jayhawks got off to a bit of a later start considering how much further the KU baseball team progressed in the postseason than usual.

The Northwoods League, a wood-bat competition centered in the upper Midwest, has long been a central location for Jayhawks to hone their talents, as well as, on some occasions, for KU to spot potential new recruits. This year, the crimson-and-blue contingent centers on a select few of the Northwoods’ 26 teams.

The St. Cloud Rox have been a bit of a KU hotspot in recent years — not a surprise for a team that heavily recruits transfers from Minnesota’s Division II schools — and that has continued this offseason.

On the pitching side, young lefty Emerson McKnight, a rising sophomore who played sparingly in his first season in Lawrence (including as the very last pitcher KU deployed all year in its season-ending loss to Oklahoma), allowed two runs through his first 7 2/3 innings since joining St. Cloud. Manning West is a right-hander who will be a redshirt senior next year and has been a reliable bullpen piece for the Jayhawks. He only recently arrived with the Rox. JUCO transfer righty Aiden Lieser (Iowa Western) is also expected to appear in St. Cloud later this summer, according to an announcement from earlier in the year as well as a member of the team’s front office.

One future Jayhawk infielder is no longer on the Rox’s roster after appearing 15 games. That would be shortstop Chris Tavarez, originally from Puerto Rico and recently of El Paso Community College, who was a bit cold at the plate with a .128 average and had a .931 fielding percentage.

KU will hope for more success out of LSU Eunice with Aidan Mouton, who hit a whopping .429 with 14 home runs and 75 RBIs for the Bengals this season. In St. Cloud, Mouton has primarily played left field and batted .317 through 10 games. Not far away was Colton Rother, his future teammate from Western Oklahoma State College who has consistently made the Rox’s starting lineup at third base. Rother, through 12 games of his own, started strong at 15-for-38 (.395).

The other cluster of Jayhawks in the Northwoods is on the Wausau Woodchucks, whose roster features four more, all position players, all of whom are hitting well this summer.

Jake Berkland is a recent acquisition, last year’s shortstop and leadoff hitter for Minnesota State. In his third year with the Woodchucks, he has started out by batting .312 through 21 games with 11 RBIs and 16 walks. Elsewhere in the infield are first baseman Ryan Chase (Santa Fe College), who has been one of the team’s best overall hitters with a .333 average and four home runs in 27 games, and catcher Holden Groebl (Cowley College), who is hitting .273 himself. (All stats are as of Saturday morning.)

The last Jayhawk on the roster for the moment is center fielder Bradon Durfee, a longtime KU signee from Pasco-Hernando State College off to a solid start in the early days of his Wausau tenure at .303 in nine games.

Three more KU players for next season — at least as of now — are elsewhere in the Northwoods. Two of them, Gavyn Schlotterback and Ty Thomson, both returnees, are on the Badlands Big Sticks.

For Schlotterback, it’s the second year in a row on the Big Sticks. A lot has changed for him in the interim, as he discovered last fall that — despite having just played 58 games at Paris Junior College and 44 more in the Northwoods — it was not safe for him to continue playing baseball due to an enlarged ascending aorta, which required open heart surgery. After a successful procedure, Schlotterback worked his way back to good health by the start of the KU baseball season, but ultimately redshirted. Now, for the Big Sticks, he is seeing his first game action since the potentially life-saving procedure. Through 14 games, the catcher has improved slightly on his production from last summer by batting .283.

Thomson is a big lefty from Des Moines Area Community College (KU coach Dan Fitzgerald’s former school) who didn’t pitch much for the Jayhawks as a junior. The Big Sticks are using him as a starter, a role in which he has split a pair of starts, including going 3 2/3 innings scoreless against Minot on June 14.

The final Jayhawk in the Northwoods is Sawyer Cooney, a freshman from Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, who redshirted during the 2026 campaign. He is playing in his home state for the Royal Oak Leprechauns and has made five early appearances.

While the Northwoods is quite prominent, summer wood-bat baseball scatters players across the country. The most famous summer league of all is the Cape Cod Baseball League, and KU is expected to have a representative there in the form of Jamie Palmese, a transfer center fielder who was all-conference at East Tennessee State. (It’s the third straight offseason in which the Jayhawks have added a former Buccaneer.) The Bourne Braves have announced him as a member of their team for the summer, though he has not been added to the roster or recorded a stat yet.

On the opposite coast, Jake Overstreet, from Weatherford College, is plying his trade with the Wenatchee AppleSox of the West Coast League. Another catcher, he is hitting .162 through 11 games. Hutch Russell played his junior-college ball at Seminole State College in Oklahoma and hasn’t gone far for the summer, as he is currently with the Hays Larks of the Rocky Mountain Baseball League.

One of KU’s high school recruits, infielder Logan Honikel of El Modena High School in California, is listed on a Cincinnati-area 18-and-under team called the Midland Redskins. St. Louis-area outfielder GT Taylor, who is also on the team, recently decommitted from KU.

photo by: St. Cloud Rox

Pitching for the St. Cloud Rox, Emerson McKnight delivers during a game against the Willmar Stingers on Sunday, June 14, 2026, in St. Cloud, Minn.

photo by: St. Cloud Rox

Playing for the St. Cloud Rox, Chris Tavarez waits for a pitch in this undated photo in St. Cloud, Minn.

photo by: St. Cloud Rox

Playing for the St. Cloud Rox, Aidan Mouton connects with the ball during a game against the Willmar Stingers on Saturday, June 13, 2026, in St. Cloud, Minn.

photo by: St. Cloud Rox

Playing for the St. Cloud Rox, Colton Rother makes a throw during a game against the Willmar Stingers on Saturday, June 13, 2026, in St. Cloud, Minn.

photo by: Wausau Woodchucks

Playing for the Wausau Woodchucks, Jake Berkland jogs during a game against the Lakeshore Chinooks on Tuesday, June 2, 2026, in Wausau, Wis.

photo by: Wausau Woodchucks

Playing for the Wausau Woodchucks, Ryan Chase rounds the bases during a game against the Lakeshore Chinooks on Wednesday, June 3, 2026, in Wausau, Wis.

photo by: Wausau Woodchucks

Playing for the Wausau Woodchucks, Holden Groebl prepares to catch against the Lakeshore Chinooks on Wednesday, June 3, 2026, in Wausau, Wis.

photo by: Wausau Woodchucks

Playing for the Wausau Woodchucks, Bradon Durfee slides into third base in this undated photo in Wausau, Wis.

photo by: Amber Badura/Badlands Big Sticks

Playing for the Badlands Big Sticks, Gavyn Schlotterback swings at a pitch during a game against the Mankato MoonDogs on Tuesday, June 16, 2026, in Dickinson, N.D.

photo by: Amber Badura/Badlands Big Sticks

Playing for the Badlands Big Sticks, Ty Thomson pitches during a game against the Minot Hot Tots on Sunday, June 14, 2026, in Dickinson, N.D.

photo by: Casey Burke/Royal Oak Leprechauns

Playing for the Royal Oak Leprechauns, Sawyer Cooney pitches during a game against the Kenosha Kingfish on Sunday, June 14, 2026, in Royal Oak, Mich.

photo by: AppleSox Media

Playing for the Wenatchee AppleSox, Jake Overstreet runs the bases against the Kamloops NorthPaws on Monday, June 8, 2026, in Wenatchee, Wash.