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WIAA Teams to Watch: Altoona

April 4, 2024
By: Maddox Durst
Staff Writer

The 2024 Wisconsin high school baseball season is here and, as usual, excitement is abound throughout the state. Players and coaches have been working in preparation for the spring season and, as is the case each year, there are some very talented players and teams across the Badger State.  

Teams across the state have goals and aspirations to finish their seasons in their respective WIAA Division State Championship, but there is plenty of work to be done before that becomes reality. In the weeks leading up to the opening day, we released our initial Power 25 Rankings, which can be found here. Now we will take a look at teams that earned Power 25 consideration with these 'Teams to Watch' pieces.

Please keep checking back throughout the season as we will be your one-stop shop for everything related to high school baseball across Wisconsin. Each week we will be releasing our Power 25, Players of the Week, Diamond Notes, Scout Blog and much more.

Our 2024 season coverage continues today.

High School: Altoona Railroaders
Head Coach: Craig Walter
WIAA Division: 2
Conference: Middle Border
2023 Record (Finish): 21-5 (State Semifinalists)

Key Players Lost: Evan Gustafson (Oregon State), Christian Varsho (Winona State University)

 

ROSTER PREVIEW

No. of Returning Starters: 7
No. of Returning Pitchers: 5

NAME STATE CLASS POS COMMITMENT
Trent Cornell WI 2024 MIF San Francisco
Mason Lange WI 2024 RHP/OF -
Keaton Camastral WI 2024 RHP/INF -
AJ Lenbrg WI 2024 UTIL -
Cameron St. John WI 2025 RHP/1B -
Bennett Stokke WI 2025 RHP -
Kellen Smith WI 2025 INF/RHP -

TEAM OUTLOOK

Altoona hovered around the back end of the Power 25 for a majority of the 2023 season, and eventually made some noise in the playoffs by making a run that ended in the semifinals of the state tournament.

With the help of their ace and 2023 Middle Border Player of the Year in RHP Bennett Stokke (2025), the Railroaders are back as contenders for the Division 2 crown. While they will need to replace some production on both ends of the field, Stokke’s prowess on the mound continued to show well at the Eau Claire Preseason ID—rushing his fastball up to 89 mph in a clean ‘pen.

RHP/1B Cameron St. John (2025) is one of the most powerful bats in the state, and recently reached 94 mph in a strong bullpen session at the Milwaukee Preseason ID a couple of weeks ago.

SS Trent Cornell (2024; San Francisco commit) is one of the leaders in this group, and is surrounded by key contributors in RHP/OF Mason Lange (2024), RHP/INF Keaton Camastral (2024) and INF/RHP Kellen Smith (2025). Lange and Camastral were a combined 9-0 on the mound last season, and continue to add to the depth of this group.

Find more information on the 2024 Altoona program below:

2024 TEAM PREVIEWS