What A Run
Jun 22, 2004 | Baseball
June 22, 2004
NEW ORLEANS, La. - Coaches often use a clich? when talking about their seasons: it's a marathon, not a sprint. For the 2004 Tulane University baseball team, that marathon featured peaks and valleys. But when it was all said and done, the Green Wave finished the year 41-21, runner-up in Conference USA with a 21-9 league mark, and advanced all the way to the NCAA Super Regionals after winning the NCAA Oxford Regional in three games.
Along the way, Tulane had a nine-game winning streak from March 20-April 3, never lost more than three in a row, and rolled through the Regional in Oxford, Miss., before concluding the season in Fullerton, Calif., in a best-of-three series versus homestanding Cal State Fullerton. Tulane came up shy in the Supers, dropping back-to-back games to the Titans, 9-0 and 10-7, but that could not take away from the team's accomplishments in its 11th season under head coach Rick Jones.
"We had a relatively young club that simply played hard every day," Jones said. "Every time we hit a bump in the road, they bounced back and got right back on track. I really trusted this team, and enjoyed coaching them every day. The Super Regional experience will no doubt help us next year."
Heading into the season, the Green Wave was faced with having to replace three of its top four hitters as Michael Aubrey, Tony Giarratano and Jonny Kaplan had all moved on to professional baseball. In addition, the Tulane pitching staff, which was supposed to be the strength of the club, suffered a pair of season-ending injuries to junior flame-thrower Ricky Fairchild and sophomore split-finger specialist Brandon Gomes, who both underwent successful Tommy John surgery, and highly-touted freshman hurler Chris Worster was plagued by shoulder tendonitis throughout the year.
Tulane, however, got an infusion of fresh talent in the form of a pair of transfers from the University of Miami - outfielder Matt Barket and catcher Greg Dini - and a junior college transfer from Blinn College - second baseman Joe Holland.
Barket finished the season as the team's leading hitter with a .370 mark and 13 stolen bases, while Dini paced the squad with 11 home runs and ranked third on the club with a .354 batting average. Holland, meanwhile, posted a .973 fielding percentage - the highest of any Tulane infielder in 2004 - and chipped in with a .318 average and a team-best 19 doubles to go along with eight home runs, 32 RBI and a pair of stolen bases.
"If you have a team with a lot of committed kids - committed to the right team goals and principles - you can overcome the lack of experience," Jones said. "The transfers came in looking for an opportunity to compete for playing time and did a tremendous job for us. They bought into the team philosophy and endeared themselves to their teammates. Now, they all sincerely bleed Tulane Green."
The pitching staff, meanwhile, got stellar showings from its stable of arms as sophomores Brian Bogusevic and J.R. Crowel, along with senior right-hander Cory Hahn, all earned All C-USA honors for their performances during the 2004 season. The healthy Green Wave arms gave the team eight shutout victories - the most by a Tulane team since 1978 and just one shy of the school record of nine set by the 1976 club - including complete-game shutouts by Hahn and Crowel in game three of the East Carolina series and versus Western Kentucky in game two of the NCAA Oxford Regional, respectively.
 Sophomore J.R. Crowel was named first-team All-Conference USA after posting eight wins and a team-best 3.39 ERA in 103.2 innings of work.  | |
From there, the boys in olive green and sky blue rattled off seven consecutive wins, including a sweep of C-USA foe Charlotte, and took two of three at Cincinnati. After winning a hard-fought series against Louisville, the squad hit a bump in the road during a week in mid-April as Tulane dropped a 6-4 decision to cross-town foe UNO in game three of the Popeyes Cup, and came up on the wrong side of a 2-1 series loss to league foe UAB in Birmingham, Ala.
As they would all year, the Green Wave bounced back, sweeping Southern Miss by a combined score of 33-12, and winning two of three from Memphis and USF. The Wave then swept the Saint Louis Billikens in the final home series of the season at Turchin Stadium.
Tulane hit a lull in the two weeks prior to NCAA postseason play as the Green Wave dropped two of three at Houston and made a quick exit from the 2004 Conference USA Tournament with an 0-2 showing.
Instead of sulking, the Green Wave got back to work on the practice field, and after earning the No. 3 seed at Ole Miss, Tulane went on to win its second Regional crown in the past four years. Bogusevic gave the Green Wave a dominant, 8.2-inning performance against second-seeded Washington in the first game to propel the squad to a 3-2 victory, Crowel blanked Western Kentucky in game two, and Tulane pounded out 14 hits in the championship game versus the Huskies for a 12-3 win that propelled the team to the Super Regionals.
 Junior Matt Barket made the most of his change of scenery to lead the Green Wave in batting average, hits and stolen bases. | |
Six Tulane players claimed a spot on the Oxford Regional All-Tournament Team - including infielders Holland and Brian Bormaster, Crowel and centerfielder Nathan Southard - but no one had a performance quite like Bogusevic, who named the Regional's Most Outstanding Player.
In the three games, Bogusevic ot the job done with his bat, arm and glove as he hit .364 (4-for-11) with a home run, six RBI and three walks, earned a win in the 3-2 win over Washington in game one, and made a tide-turning catch in rightfield in the championship game as the Green Wave bounced back from a 3-1 deficit to win the game.
While the Green Wave fell one step shy of their second trip to the College World Series, the future looks bright for the team from Uptown New Orleans as Tulane is scheduled to return seven positional starters and nine experienced pitchers for next season.
Among that list is a quartet of All-Conference USA performers in first-teamers Barket and Crowel, as well as Bogusevic, who earned second-team honors and rookie pitcher Daniel Latham, who claimed All-Freshman Team recognition. In addition, Bogusevic was named second-team All-American by Baseball America and the American Baseball Coaches Association, honorable-mention All-American by CollegeBaseballInsider.com and first-team All-South Region by the ABCA. Barket, meanwhile, garnered third-team All-America honors from the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association.
"On paper, I expect us to be ranked very high going into the 2005 season," Jones said. "That does not mean that we can let up, though. Heading into this season, Rice and Stanford were ranked 1-2 in most of the preseason polls, and neither of them made the Super Regionals. We have to continue to work hard and come out ready to play every day."
If the 2004 season is any foreshadowing of things to come, that should not be a problem.
