Highly-recruited Wolfe Selects Vanderbilt

Matthew Wolfe SS / RHP / Olentangy Orange, OH / 2022

WESTERVILLE - Before Matt Wolfe even played one high school baseball game, he had a college offer.

“I’m like, I’m going to play this slow,” noted Wolfe, now a sophomore at Olentangy Orange.

But that changed when Vanderbilt - the 2019 national champions - showed an interest.

“Once conversation got deeper with Vanderbilt I knew it was done,” admitted the third-rated 2022 in Ohio. “That’s where I wanted to be.”

The 6-1 166-pounder first got on the radar of Vanderbilt in the fall of 2018.

“I was talking with my high school coach and he gave me information on a one-day camp there,” Wolfe reflected. “I went to it but afterward I didn’t hear anything.”

However, two months later there was communication with assistant coach Mike Baxter. Fittingly, Orange had a spring trip scheduled to play in Tennessee where Baxter was able to see Wolfe in game action.

Conversation continued with his summer team playing in a tournament in Nashville before Wolfe attended another camp at Vandy upon advice from high school coach Tom Marker.

“He said coach Baxter recommended coming to the camp,” Wolfe said. “It was full, but he got me in.”

A shortstop as well as pitcher, Wolfe won the Defensive Player Award at the camp.

“I talked to their coaches,” Wolfe related about the camp. “The culture there is unreal.”