By Todd Golden
WICHITA, Kan. — There’s no way, shape or form that anyone who saw Indiana State’s baseball team in its Sycamore Field finale on May 10 would have said to themselves, “This isn’t going to end well.”
At that point, ISU had a one-game lead in the Missouri Valley Conference, the Sycamores had won five conference series in a row, they had a 33-14 record that was one of the best in school history by winning percentage, and ISU had just bludgeoned Evansville by a 36-7 margin in its final home series.
Thirteen days later, all of that was just a fond memory replaced by a nightmarish vision of 11-run deficits (at Missouri State) and 11 unanswered runs (scored by Wichita State in Wednesday’s MVC Tournament opener).
The extraordinarily ill-timed seven-game losing streak that ended the season on an extreme down note was as resounding as its rise through the Missouri Valley Conference. No one was prepared for it, no one seemed to know how to extricate the Sycamores from it.
The on-field reasons for the Sycamores’ demise were clear — the timely hitting, and particularly, timely pitching — disappeared in a poof of smoke.
Apart from that, did the Sycamores not handle the pressure of being front-runners and contenders? Only they know that.
And ultimately ... it doesn’t really matter. Yes, the fog of the season-ending losing streak is going to linger, how could it not? But when ISU’s season is taken as a whole, it was a success.
"It’s difficult to put anything into perspective because of the way we finished. For basically a month, if you gave us an opportunity to score a run or put someone away, we did. Every single time. For the last two weeks, we haven’t put anything together," ISU coach Lindsay Meggs said. "Right now it hurts, and you don’t feel good about anything, but when we look back, these guys are a part of the group that got us over the hump and back into contention in the league."
Given the finish, it’s worth a reminder that conference title contention and NCAA talk was but a rumor for the previous five seasons. ISU was picked sixth in this year’s preseason conference poll, and there were many who thought that was an optimistic prediction.
There’s no need to remind ISU’s 11 seniors how far ISU has come.
To a man, all of them exit a program in far better shape than the way it was when they came in.
"It’s definitely on its way up. It’s completely different from where it was when I got here. We decided to do it as a team this year and I think that’s what got us to where we were at," said senior left fielder Brady Shoemaker, who was as instrumental as anyone in turning the Sycamores’ fortunes around.
All of them entered the program when it was at its most uncertain point in years. Many either came to ISU in the late Bob Warn era or early in Lindsay Meggs’ coaching tenure, a time when ISU had little to offer in on-field success other than a chance to play and build the program into something.
They experienced plenty of growing pains along the way, not qualifying for the MVC Tournament for three consecutive years, before it came together this year.
"The thing I reflect on is that they took a chance on me. They took a chance on us. They could have gone other places, they had options. We didn’t have much to offer at the moment they committed to us. We told them what we were going to do, what our goals were, and I’m thrilled we got there even a little sooner than we thought we would," Meggs said. "I appreciate the seniors who took a chance on us and invested their time and devotion to our program. They are the program. Where we are is a direct reflection of having the right guys. We were lucky to have them."
Unfortunately for now, ISU’s season-ending collapse will define 2009 as much as its rise to the top of the conference did. But it will be interesting to see how this season is viewed in a year or five years down the line. Was it the dawn of a new era of Sycamore success?
It won’t be easy next year. Many of the departing seniors — Shoemaker, catcher Bronco Lafrenz, first baseman Brian Jett, among others — will take a lot of production out the door with them. Several others — Ryan Strausborger, Nick Ciolli, Jake Petricka, Joe Rodriguez, Luke Fieser all jump to mind — could be gone via the Major League Baseball draft.
But ISU is in a far better position than its been in years to reload instead of rebuild. There’s talent on the roster coming back and more coming in. And the new stadium will only help the cause of building a consistent winner.
The optimism that surrounds ISU’s baseball program is the greatest legacy of the departing seniors, despite the way their careers ended.
"Everyone knows it takes years to turn a program around, especially at this level and in this league. For us to be where we’re at in [Meggs’] third year, I’m just proud to be a part of it," said departing ISU first baseman Brian Jett. "I couldn’t ask for better guys to go out with."
Todd Golden is sports editor of the Tribune-Star. He can be reached at (812) 231-4272 or todd.golden@tribstar.com.
