This win was a long time coming. Fifteen years to be exact.
Montclair State University became
the first team in 15 years to win the NCAA Division III Baseball Championship
after losing its first game in the tournament.
The Red Hawks won the title Tuesday
by beating the University of St. Thomas 6-2 in the championship game at Fox Cities
Stadium. Montclair had to beat St. Thomas twice because the Tommies entered the
day as the only unbeaten team. Montclair beat St. Thomas 13-3 in the opening game
Tuesday.
"It's very satisfying,"
Montclair State head coach Norm Schoenig said. "To come out of the loser's
bracket is a real testament to these kids.
"Once you eliminate that final
destination and work at the job at hand, you get where you want to go."
Montclair got a superlative pitching
performance from sophomore Corey Hamman (8-2), who was named the tournament's
Most Valuable Player. Hamman allowed seven hits and one earned run while going
the distance. Hamman struck out five and didn't walk a batter. For the tournament,
Hamman pitched 15 2-3 innings and allowed just eight hits and one earned run.
"Against the level of competition
we played ... to give up just one earned run, I can't even believe it," Hamman
said.
"When I went out on the mound,
I didn't think about anything but hitting spots and throwing strikes."
Mike Honsa (10-4) went the distance
and took the loss.
"They just outplayed us. They've
got better hitters," St. Thomas head coach Dennis Denning said of Montclair.
"It's tough to take when your expectations were nice and high. They had more
bullets than we did."
Montclair got on the board in the
bottom of the second inning. Brian Ellerson started the rally when third baseman
Jon Guion fielded his ground ball and made a wild throw. The bad throw allowed
Ellerson to advance to second. Frank Longo followed with a high chopper over Guion's
head and into left field, allowing Ellerson to score for a 1-0 lead.
The Red Hawks made it 5-0 in the third.
Montclair strung together five consecutive hits, started by Craig Conway's single
to center field. George Gallagher followed with a single to left field, and Ellerson's
infield single loaded the bases. Longo then doubled over the head of right fielder
Ryan Benson to score Conway and Gallagher to make it 3-0. Frank Francia then singled
up the middle to score Ellerson and Benson to give Montclair a 5-0 lead.
"This is the best hitting team
I've ever played for, one through nine," said Conway, adding the team's character
was key to a run to the title through the loser's bracket.
"That's the only way to sum it
up. This team has a lot of heart. Our guys deserve a lot of credit. They never
got down. They never gave up."
St. Thomas cut the lead to 5-1 in
the fifth with the help of a Montclair error. Steve Aronson's fly ball to center
field to lead off the inning was dropped, allowing Aronson to advance to second.
After a ground out, Benson singled past second baseman Dave Wurst to score Aronson.
Montclair got that run back in the
sixth inning. Francia started the inning with a one-out single, and Marc Houser
walked to put runners at first and second. After Jeff Schriber lined out, Wurst
stroked a single to left field to score Francia and build the lead to 6-1.
"I tip my hat to them,"
Honsa said. "They got hits when they needed them, when it counted."
The Tommies had a chance for a big
inning in the eighth, but Hamman was able to escape serious damage. With one out,
Matt Buzzell was hit by a pitch and Jake Mauer followed with a single to put runners
at first and second. A wild pitch moved the runners to second and third, and Dan
Novak followed with a ground out to score Buzzell to trim the lead to 6-2. Hamman
then got Luke Sather to ground out to end the inning.
The Tommies managed one hit in the
ninth, but Montclair turned a 3-6-1 double play to end the game.
Notes
Montclair is the first team since 1985 to win national title after losing its
opening game. The University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh was the last team to do it.
The championship was Montclair's third
national title. Montclair is the third school to win three titles, joining Eastern
Connecticut and Marietta. Montclair won titles in 1987 and 1993.
Montclair, which finished second in
1998, was playing in its fourth title game.
Montclair has 24 World Series wins,
trailing UW-Oshkosh and Marietta, which have 31 apiece.
This is Montclair's 11th World Series
appearance, which is third-most in series history. Oshkosh leads with 16 appearances
and Marietta is second with 15.
North Carolina Wesleyan was the last
team to sweep a pair of games in the championship round to win the title. North
Carolina Wesleyan defeated California State-Stanislaus in 1989 to accomplish the
feat.
St. Thomas was the runner-up in 1999.
Only two others teams have finished second in consecutive years, Oshkosh in 1987
and 1988 and Marietta in 1984 and 1985.
The total attendance for the five
days was 12,336. That is the fifth highest total in 25-year history of the event.
This is the first year of a three-year stint of the NCAA Division III Baseball
Championships at Fox Cities Stadium. |
