There are many things coaches can build with a team, but experience on the field isn’t something that can be taught.

It has to be earned by going through the rigors of a long season, and much of the state-qualifying Marshalltown baseball team has put in its dues on the diamond.

Nearly all of the starting lineup for the Bobcats has seen significant time over the last three seasons, and head coach Steve Hanson said much of the team’s success stems from his large senior class.

“I’m convinced after the time I’ve spent in this that it begins with your senior guys,” Hanson said. “We have a very strong senior group, the largest senior group we’ve had by my recollection since 2001 or 2002. For a long time we haven’t had 10 seniors, and those 10 seniors are very vocal and very independent. There’s a lot of energy there, you just kind of have to keep it in between the lines and get them pointed in the right direction.”

At the head of that senior group is the pitcher-catcher duo of Nate Vance and Kody Ricken, and Hanson said having experience at those premium defensive positions is invaluable.

“If you’ve got a senior pitcher and a senior catcher, then you are in pretty good shape,” he said. “Those guys have been around, they’ve been through the wars, they’ve been knocked down and just keep getting back up. They’re not afraid, they’ve been through a lot of stuff and they are anxious. They wish it was Wednesday right now.”

Vance, whose stated goal since the start of the season was to end the program’s nine-year state drought, said the team has been through nearly every high and low one can imagine.

“The past few years we haven’t won a substate game since I’ve been here. I’ve pitched three first substate games and lost two of them, we know how low you feel after your season is over and you watch the other team on the other side celebrate,” Vance said. “But then we’ve seen the highs, we started the season at 11-2, had a hot start, got to experience that high of the town talking about a successful baseball program. Then we caught a slump of losing seven in a row, so we’ve experienced everything.”

Junior Dylan Eygabroad, who has been a contributor on the team since his freshman year, said going through these last three years with many of the same guys has brought them all closer.

“It makes this a whole lot better. We are so tight together, we hang out all the time and just spend time together,” he said. “We just love each other.”

Fellow junior Tate Kuehner said these bonds have been building well before any of the current players were in high school.

“We’ve played ever since we were little guys in little league and AAU,” Kuehner said. “It’s really fun to play together and now that we are older we have some great chemistry together.”

Senior Sam Irwin said when you’ve played with guys for as long as much of this team has, breaking through with this first state qualification since 2009 is extra special.

“We’ve played with some of these kids since I was in third grade, so nine years, and you just get to know each other really well,” Irwin said. “We have a lot of experience playing on varsity together and we’ve been working for nine or ten years so finally all the work has paid off for us.”

The Bobcats will have to rely on all that chemistry, work and experience when it takes on two-seeded Urbandale in the first round of state tonight, but Vance said he believes in what this team can do and has gone through.

“We have nothing to lose, Urbandale has everything to lose. There’s not a better position to be in, especially as a Bobcat,” Vance said. “Coach Hanson believes in our team and we love the spot that we’re in. I don’t think there’s anyone on this team that doesn’t think we can’t go win on Wednesday, then win Friday and win Saturday. We’ve beat all these teams before, I don’t see why we can’t do it again.”

Marshalltown will face the J-Hawks tonight in the first round of the Class 4A bracket of the Iowa High School State Baseball Tournament with first pitch scheduled for 7:30 p.m. at Principal Park in Des Moines.