BRADENTON, Fla. — Nick Patten has been targeting a professional baseball career for a long time.

This year, he sacrificed his would-be senior year at Butler to hone in on that target.

That decision may be paying off.

Patten spent the 2014-15 academic year playing baseball and attending school at IMG Academy in Florida. He wound up hitting .320 this spring with four homers and 22 RBI.

“I’ve been playing baseball non-stop since last spring,” Patten said. “Playing year-round has made such a difference.

“I learned a new position and I got the college scholarship I was looking for.”

A third baseman with the Golden Tornado, Patten played first base for the IMG Academy Ascenders this season. The Ascenders are the premiere team of the Academy, which features five teams and 120 players.

Patten led the entire Academy in home runs. His team’s coach was former Cincinnati Reds third baseman Chris Sabo. All of the coaches in the organization have major league experience.

“When I got down here, the third baseman in place is getting his name called in the major league draft this week,” Patten said. “I didn’t like my chances of supplanting him.

“All I wanted to do was get on the field as a regular. There was no incumbent first baseman, so I told myself I’m going to win that position.”

IMG Academy hitting coach Pete Paciorek — a former teammate of Butler’s Matt Clement in the San Diego Padres’ farm system — worked with Patten offensively and defensively.

The 6-foot-4, 195-pound Patten wound up earning an IMG Academy Golden Glove Award for his defensive work at first base. MLB scouting rated Patten the 20th best high school first baseman in the country.

IMG Academy played in three of the top high school tournaments in the country — at Cal State-Fullerton, Orlando and Atlanta, Ga. — and Patten made the all-tournament team at the Atlanta event, hitting .400 with a home run.

“I owe a lot to Coach Paciorek ... all of my coaches,” Patten said. “They really worked with me. I didn’t expect to get drafted this year. The scouts have told me I’m a player who needs the college seasoning first.

“My goal is to play three seasons at Delaware and then get drafted.”

The Blue Hens were 26-24 last season under 15th-year coach Jim Sherman, who has won 443 games there.

Delaware has had 30 baseball players drafted since 2000, including four in 2013.

“The program and facilities are top of the line,” said Patten, who plans to major in business. “I can’t wait to get there. I have a chance to be the starting first baseman my freshman year.”

Other schools showing interest in Patten included Xavier, Bucknell, South Carolina, West Virginia and Miami-Dade, the top-ranked Division I JUCO program.

“It was an extremely difficult decision to send him down there,” Darryl Patten, Nick’s father, said of Florida. “He was firmly entrenched in two sports at Butler.

“But after talking to people, submitting the application, going through the interview process and touring the facility, this was the right move to make.”

Patten was Butler basketball’s leading scorer as a junior, averaging 13.4 points per game. He was one of the Tornado baseball team’s top hitters as well.

“Leaving Butler was hard,” Patten admitted. “Your senior year is supposed to be when you go out with a bang, making a good impression on your teammates and peers.

“But I got great support from coaches in Butler — Matt Clement, Gene Rodgers, Todd Erdos — and we weighed the pros and cons. Ultimately, this was the best opportunity to set me up for the goals I want to achieve in life.”

Patten returned home recently and will play for the Astro Falcons in the Youngstown B League this summer.