CHEMISTRY LIFTS COASTAL CAROLINA
Team banded together after March malaise
Coastal Carolina baseball coach Gary Gilmore was frustrated.
The Chanticleers were 7-7 in March and needed to turn things around to earn a spot in the NCAA tournament. So Gilmore held a team meeting in the locker room.
“They told us, ‘Look, you need to chill out. Start playing for one another. If someone doesn’t get a bunt down, the next guy’s got to get a hit,’ ” right-hander Andrew Beckwith says about the coaching staff’s message. “That’s been our thing all year, to stick with the process and pick each other up. We did a great job of it after that little skid.”
Coastal Carolina earned a No. 2 seed in the NCAA tournament and continued to play loose and with team unity to become the first Big South Conference school to win the College World Series.
The Chanticleers defied odds all postseason. Coastal Carolina won at LSU on a walk-off single, defeated No. 1 overall seed Florida and won back-to-back games against Texas Christian and Arizona in the championship. But the Chanticleers never doubted their chances.
“It’s something we don’t even realize that we’ve done yet,” righthander Bobby Holmes said. “We’re still dreaming. A couple of days down the road we’ll wake up and realize what we did for this town, this program and Coach Gilmore. There’s a genuine love on this team that I’ve never felt anything like it.”
Beckwith didn’t think a championship was realistic after Coastal Carolina got off to a slow start. But after adjusting their pitching rotation, the Chanticleers (55-18, 21-3 Big South) responded by dominating their conference.
Still, the Southeastern and Atlantic Coast conferences had a combined 17 teams in the 64team tournament, and Coastal Carolina was the lone Big South school to make the field. In the past 50 years, only five other non-power conference schools have won the College World Series.
The odds were stacked against the Chanticleers from the start of the postseason. They were down to their last at-bat in an elimination game against North Carolina State in the Raleigh Regional. Trailing 5-3, Coastal Carolina had loaded the bases with one out when the game was delayed to the next day because of rain.
When the team got on the bus before going back to its hotel, Gilmore told his players: “I know 100% we’re going to win this game,” and he took his players step-by-step on who was going to make a big hit and who would close the game. Though Gilmore wasn’t correct on every detail, he instilled confidence in his team, and the Chanticleers scored four runs in the ninth to seal a spot in the super regionals.
“We never really had any pres- sure on us,” Holmes said. “Wherever we went, we were the lower seed or the underdog. If at any point we lost, it was going to be a good season for us. Playing with that looseness and having as much fun as we did really kept the energy positive in the dugout and on the field.”
It wasn’t until winning the Baton Rouge super regional that the Chanticleers realized how close they were to surprising the country with a national championship.
The Chanticleers led at LSU, but the Tigers rallied to tie the score entering the bottom of the ninth. Coastal Carolina hadn’t had a hit since the sixth inning, but shortstop Michael Paez managed one to drive in outfielder Anthony Marks and qualify his team for the Series.
Though they’re from a midmajor conference, the Chanticleers weren’t intimidated by facing historically strong college baseball programs.
“At that point we thought, ‘It can’t get any harder than this,’ ” Gilmore said. “It was so loud, you couldn’t hear yourself think. We hadn’t been in an environment like that. To get out of that place and … send us to Omaha, it was an incredible moment. It was like time stood still for a little bit.”
The Chanticleers shocked Florida, then lost to Texas Christian, meaning they would need to win three consecutive games through the loser’s bracket to qualify for the championship. So the team got together in a meeting room in its hotel near Omaha. Gilmore thought his team’s chemistry could lead his squad out of its tough situation.
“I told them, ‘You guys are the best friends of each other. You’re the closest team I’ve ever coached. That brotherhood that you all have is really going to be tested. If you guys want to spend another week together that you’ll never forget for the rest of your life, we need to band together tighter than we ever have,’ ” Gilmore said.
The players responded: “Hey Coach, we’re going to play for another day. We’re not going home.”
They stuck to their word. Coastal Carolina defeated Texas Tech before beating Texas Christian in back-to-back games. The Chanticleers lost to Arizona in the first game of the finals but won the next two behind clutch hitting and reliable pitching.
Tears rolled down Gilmore’s face as his players hugged one another after winning their school’s first national championship in any sport.
Eight seniors were on the Chanticleers roster, a rarity in college baseball when most top college players leave after getting drafted in their junior year. Gilmore, who took the job in 1996, said past teams might have had more talent, but this year’s squad had the best chemistry.
Coastal Carolina prides itself on relentlessness and selflessness. When the Chanticleers’ postseason run seemed close to ending, they turned to those two attributes to persevere, as Gilmore had preached to his team four months earlier.
“They just banded together and would not let themselves be denied,” Gilmore said. “(Winning the championship) is the greatest feeling in the whole world.”