Despite what has been a historically bad Division 1 baseball season here in the Palmetto State in 2026 (minus Coastal Carolina), including midweek losses by Clemson to Upstate and USC to Winthrop, not all is as bad as it may seem. One consistent factor for the past nine seasons has been North Greenville University baseball under Head Coach Landon Powell.
Powell’s Trailblazer’s baseball team will host a regional beginning Thursday at 6 PM when NGU welcomes fellow Upstate rival Lander University in Tigerville. Completing this regional are the University of North Georgia and Francis Marion from the Pee Dee. The winner of this regional will move on to take on the winner at Catawba College that also includes Belmont Abbey, Wingate and Young Harris.
The NCAA D-2 World Series takes place in Cary, NC and if Landon Powell’s squad can make a successful run then Cary should be a place they are comfortable with. North Greenville won the D-2 National Championship in 2022 and has made several other deep runs towards a title over the past decade.
As I spoke with Landon, he was quick to mention that this would be no easy task. “North Greenville is located in the toughest region in the country. All three teams besides us, in our regional, have been ranked in the Top 15 during the season. Lenoir Rhyne, one of our conference members, was a Top 20 team that didn’t even make the playoffs. We feel we have faced the best of the best this season and look forward to competing this weekend”.
The Trailblazers enter this postseason at 47-10, and while speaking highly of his team as a unit, Powell admitted that Sophomore Pitcher Matty Brown from Charleston has been a strength for this team after being named last years “2025 National Freshman of the Year” with a 10-0 record. Junior outfielder Josh Foulks hit 8 homeruns last season and batted 300. The 6’5” outfielder has raised that to 21 homeruns and more than a 400 batting average this season.
“We have a great program here at North Greenville, but the final piece to this year’s team has been transfer outfielder CJ Dean from ODU (Ohio Dominican University.) He’s done everything we have asked of him, and even more. He’s on the verge of breaking a couple of single season records here at North Greenville”.
When you have won 47 games against only ten losses, I asked Landon what made this possible? “It’s pretty simple, we do some things very well. When you lead your league in both pitching and defense, that makes the game shorter for us. We are also fortunate to have a good bullpen at this level, we have five guys back there that have a sub-3 ERA (Earned Run Average), and three that are sub-2.”
North Greenville baseball has become the epitome of success under Landon. During his nine-year run at North Greenville, his program has more wins than any other D-2 team with two more than Angelo State and seven more than Central Missouri. Only the University of Tennessee has more wins than North Greenville in all of NCAA baseball in the past five seasons with 238 wins versus NGU’s 237.
Sometimes the amount of your success can be measured in how much someone hates you and your program, and I ran in to that recently here in my hometown of Blairsville, Georgia. Just five miles down the road is Young Harris College, a school that Landon told me once did not care too much for his program.
“Young Harris has been around for a long time, and we were the new kids on the block for a few years. We aren’t that anymore, we are just rivals, and rivalries should be both fun and intense and bring out the best play in your team”.
A few weeks ago, I was told what a jerk Landon was from someone I’ve never met. Two of the Young Harris coaches live in my neighborhood and could not be any nicer, we’ve hung out with one and his wife and kids when I had a band play at our clubhouse. They are all awesome and I am happy to know them.
The night of the “Final 4 Saturday” in basketball, someone with one of the coaches decided to chew me out when he found out I was friends with Landon Powell. This man ultimately called Landon an “asshole, a fat-ass that has no talent”. I mentioned he was a top three candidate for the open South Carolina job, and I was told “you have no clue what you are talking about”.
As I got up and walked to Chelsea to pay my tab and leave, I heard the same man say loud enough for me to hear… “That guy has no idea about anything”.
By the way, North Greenville won four of the six games this season but to the Mountain Lions (Young Harris College) credit they won the conference tournament finale 13-0 and that will be interesting to see how North Greenville responds to a defeat like they haven’t seen in some time.
Fortunately, as I get further from my brain bleed and I don’t live in Greenville anymore these situations become fewer and farther between. I’ve had an awesome career, and this year alone I’ve covered the Winter Olympics in Italy, will be covering the World Cup, plus ACC and SEC Football all season, but I don’t know anything to some random dude? That’s the result of social media where everyone’s opinion is so inflamed.
When I know someone personally like Landon Powell, the Head Coach at North Greenville, it’s because I’ve known them before they got the position and will know them long after they ever coach another inning there. This particular fellow that seems to be a “never been” will slink back to where he came from, I’ve dealt with this so many times before.
There are rivalries and there is stupidity, and I was able to see the latter up close and personal. Fortunately, I walked away, paid my tab and ultimately laughed.
Head to Tigerville this weekend for some fantastic baseball action. North Greenville is ranked #3 in the country but is by no means guaranteed a pass. Three of the four participants are here from our state, plus North Georgia (the military University of Georgia) and home of the first US Mint after the first US gold rush.
Let’s go NGU, and it will be fun to see what may or may not be ahead for Landon!