‘He’s a lot like Urban Meyer’
Pishkur pushes for 7th state title, but still wants more at Andrean
Dan Dakich remembers his introduction to Andrean’s Dave Pishkur.
It was 1980, Pishkur’s first year. Dakich was a junior, and the 59ers had two-a-day practices before the season started.
Club Med was over.
“We used to practice like an hour and then go (horse) around,” Dakich said. “I remember thinking, ‘This is different.’”
Dakich had no idea then that Pishkur, the 2019 Post-Tribune Baseball Coach of the Year, would become the all-time winningest coach in state baseball history. Dakich just knew Pishkur was good.
Forty years later, Pishkur is still pushing the 59ers to the limit, with no plans to scale it back. The 59ers won their seventh Class 3A state title with a 2-1 victory over Edgewood.
It never gets old for Pishkur, who took 25 years to get his first state title. He’s averaged almost one every other year since the 2005 championship.
The 59ers (36-1) were favorites to repeat this season with Vanderbilt recruit Michael Doolin as their ace pitcher. It wasn’t easy because they lost some big bats to graduation in Joe Rycerz and Clay Thompson.
Andrean rode out the season behind the arm of Doolin and some solid defense. It was a completely different team from the one that won in 2018.
Pishkur has created a monster. Expectations are always high. State titles are the standard.
“If we would’ve lost the state championship, it would’ve been a bad ending to an amazing year,” he said.
Pishkur hit two milestones this season.
He won his 1,000th game and surpassed former LaPorte coach Ken Schreiber’s record of 1,010 wins.
For Pishkur, building the program has been about going one day at a time.
When he arrived at Andrean, he said baseball was a “glorified recreational sport.”
Now, it’s the mecca of high school baseball in Indiana.
Pishkur, a single-digit handicap golfer and an excellent baseball player, doesn’t sit still well.
“My expectation was just to make it into a good program,” he said. “I’m very competitive. It was never going to be enough. I just kept pushing and pushing and pushing.
“Did I think I was going to coach 40 years? No. Did I think I was going to stay at Andrean the whole time? Probably not. Did I think I was going to win seven st a t e c h a mp i - onships? Not a chance in the world.”
Pishkur has a straightforward, no-nonsense approach. No coddling is allowed, and he’s not afraid to level criticism at his players.
The kids who play for him expect to be coached — sometimes hard.
It’s the price they pay for being a perennial state contender.
He’s constantly searching for an edge. A couple of years ago, he bought a HitTrax. That’s a machine that measures smash factor, exit velocity and launch angles of balls off the bat.
It was good, but a pitcher had to toss balls and then batters hit into a net. Pishkur found a PitchTrax. That has a robot arm that throws live pitches to players at game speed.
Dakich said Pishkur was geared to coach.
“He’s a lot like Urban Meyer,” Dakich said. “He’ll call you out, but he’s not obnoxious. He’s disciplined. He’s always trying to improve. I’m not surprised he’s been that successful.”
Doolin said he received the full Pishkur treatment in his time. He soaked it up.
His favorite story came as a sophomore when Pishkur told him he was “t h e mo st ove r ra t e d pitcher in the state” after a subpar performance in the LaPorte Regional.
It was an obvious motivational tactic that they joke about now.
“It made me mad and I worked harder,” Doolin said.
“This ye a r ’s Dave Pishkur was more personable. He wasn’t dead serious. He just understands the group he has and what he needs to do.”