DERRY, N.H. — When Jackson Marshall transferred to UConn after his freshman year at Division 2 Southern New Hampshire University, the expectation was that a learning curve was coming. Division 1 baseball is a different animal. The jump humbles a lot of players.
Marshall wasn’t interested in being humbled.
The 6-foot-8 first baseman — who was just as feared on the basketball court as the diamond during his days at Pinkerton Academy in Derry, where he finished his career with over 2,000 points — set a quiet goal for himself before his first spring in Storrs: Big East Player of the Year.
Mission accomplished.
Named the Big East Player of the Year by the conference coaches, Marshall led the league in batting average (.384), hits (86), doubles (22), RBI (60) and on-base percentage (.483). He also ranked among the top five in home runs (14), slugging percentage (.679) and runs scored (49). Those are numbers that would turn heads in any conference. In the Big East, they were historic.
“It was a good year for me,” Marshall said. “The only thing that stinks is we’re still not playing.”
UConn finished the season without an NCAA Tournament bid for the second straight year — a notable absence for a program that had qualified six consecutive seasons from 2018 through 2024, not counting the COVID-cancelled 2020 campaign. The Huskies ended at 32-26, bounced from the Big East Championship by Xavier.
Still, Marshall’s arrival gave the program something to build around.
“Jackson was a bright spot, our most prominent player in the lineup,” said head coach Jim Penders, one of the most respected coaches in New England. “For him to come in the way he did — not only making the jump to Division 1, but competing nationally — was fun to watch.”
What strikes Penders most isn’t just the production. It’s how Marshall moves. At 6-foot-8, he has no business being as fluid as he is at first base, but the athleticism that made him the top basketball player in New Hampshire carries over in ways that go beyond the obvious.
“He’s got great hands, which we see at the plate and in the field,” Penders said. “He can move around really well for a guy that size.”
Marshall said the transition to Division 1 demanded more than just physical adjustment. The mental side — the preparation, the daily grind — was where the real work happened.
“I had to up my focus when I got here, I knew that,” he said. “I learned early the importance of putting in the work.”
As for what comes next, Penders sees a ceiling that hasn’t been touched yet. A .384 hitter doesn’t leave much room for critique, but Penders offered one anyway — the kind coaches reserve for players they believe in.
“A guy hits .380 and there isn’t much to criticize,” he said. “I think he can have a little better pitch awareness early in the counts. The thing is, he is so good with two strikes. The next level from Jackson is him hitting homers by accident — line drives that keep going. We need to find guys that can hit in front and behind him. That will help him, too.”
UConn will return both Marshall and sophomore left-hander Cayden Suchy next spring. Suchy, who was named Big East Pitcher of the Year after posting a 1.81 ERA with 54 strikeouts over 44.2 innings, gives the Huskies as dangerous a one-two punch as any team in the conference. Two conference award winners, both sophomores — the foundation is there.
Before fall workouts, though, Marshall has a summer to get through. Despite being the kind of prospect who draws Cape Cod Baseball League interest, he committed last fall to play for the Keene Swamp Bats of the New England Collegiate Baseball League — the second-ranked collegiate summer league in the country behind only the Cape — and he’s sticking to it. The Swamp Bats, defending NECBL champions, open their season next Thursday.
“I am looking forward to playing this summer, trying to get better and then get ready again in the fall,” Marshall said. “We have a great culture at UConn. We have guys that want to win.”
The Big East already knows what he can do. The rest of the country and MLB scouts are starting to catch on.