Will Post 295 baseball be back on top again?

Price has a lot of new faces to get a look at. One who isn’t is Northwest High’s Charlie Cononie, who returns to pitch for Post 295 again this season, and will be joined by Jaguar teammates Spencer Perriman and infielder Peter Maratto. In addition, fellow Northwest hurler Dominique Vattuone will get a look in the rotation. On a team heavily dominated by Quince Orchard players in year’s past — and will again this year, though the Cougars will be late additions after their season was extended to the state high-school semifinals — backyard rivalries could flare up. But, in this case, familiarity does not breed contempt.

‘‘I don’t think with this group that we will have that kind of problem,” Price said. ‘‘A lot of these guys grew up playing together in the Gaithersburg Athletic Club leagues and things like that. Every time a new player on the team comes out, someone already knows him.”

Along with the traditional public-school pipeline, Price is stocking his talent pool from some private schools as well. Gonzaga’s Matt Sliviak will play right field and pitch, and Riverdale Baptist’s Johann Knee will play second base, and hit towards the top of the lineup. An interesting new player is pitcher Kyle Ehret, who, according to Price, was home-schooled, and will attend Montgomery College-Rockville. Rounding out the pitching rotation will be Avalon’s Matt Bolden.

‘‘We have been beating the bushes this season,” Price said. ‘‘It looks like a good group, though. Most of our guys have been out there for five practices by now.”

With a plethora of arms, and athletic players, pitching and defense do not seem to be an issue. Offensively, though, a team that is known to pound the ball, will have to find out if it has a new set of swingers to replace the big sticks, including Celenza’s (.431 batting average, five home runs last year) who played at Salisbury State this season.

‘‘I don’t know if we have that kind of power this year, but we have a chance to be very balanced,” Price said. ‘‘A lot of the guys we have were hitting leadoff or at number three for their high-school teams, so we have some good hitters. We’ll see.”

Gaithersburg Post 295

Manager: Rick Smith, 24th year

Last year’s record: 23-12

Last regular-season title: 2006

Last county tournament title: 2006

Last state title: 2004 (2nd)

Players to watch: P⁄OF Charlie Cononie, 2B Johann Knee, P⁄RF Matt Sliviak, OF Spencer Perriman