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Two years ago, the Bellwood-Antis class of 2020 produced three division one athletes, one of which is finding success on the baseball diamond at Penn State University. Travis Luensmann, who started his collegiate baseball career pitching at the University of South Carolina, transferred back home to PA to play for the Nittany Lions.

As a Blue Devil, the PSU sophomore was a four time all-ICC selection and aided the team to district championship games in 2017 and 2018. Luensmann also helped the team to the state semi-finals as a freshman in 2017. In his junior season, Luensmann recorded 82 strikeouts in 49 innings and ended the season with a 1.14 earned run average. His high school career was cut short in 2020 when his senior season was canceled due to the national Covid shutdown.

Luensmann is adjusting from SEC ball at South Carolina to BIG Ten play at Penn State quite well. In his three appearances so far this season, Travis has pitched a total of 15 innings and accumulated 20 strikeouts.

“The transition in conferences wasn’t something that had much effect on myself. Quality of players and competitiveness was very similar, so I fit right in with the BIG 10,” said Luensmann.

Luensmann’s goals for this year as a Nittany Lion are to win the BIG 10 championship and earn a spot in a regional game in hopes of making it to the College World Series in Omaha.

“Personally, I’m aiming on rebuilding and re-establishing my pitching arsenal in hopes of performing well enough to be selected in this year’s MLB draft,” added Travis.

As far as Luensmann’s future at Penn State, here’s there to stay. “This is an amazing opportunity, and I’m prepared for whatever comes my way.”

Luensmann isn’t the only B-A athlete playing at Penn State. Campbell, who like Luensmann transferred to Happy Valley from another Division I school (Notre Dame), came to PSU this season and sat out as a red-shirt on the women’s basketball team.