THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, June 11, 1996 TAG: 9606110447
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: TOM ROBINSON
LENGTH: 66 lines
Long ago, on a bright Ohio morning, I stood playing second base as a baseball screamed over my head toward the rightfield fence. It was the bottom of the 12th inning, two outs, nobody on. A berth in the NCAA Division III World Series was at stake.
We, Widener University, had burst from the regional's loser's bracket to whip top-ranked Marietta 7-1 and force one final game for the Series bid.
Starting soon after our opening victory, the title game was tied 2-2 through 11 innings when the umpire stopped play because of darkness. We were ordered to resume the next morning, and so we did.
Our side went down in order in the top of the 12th.
Their side did not.
When that ball disappeared beyond the fence, and my freshman season had abruptly ended, I wasn't even off the field before I dissolved into the arms of our senior first baseman, chest heaving, spirit crushed.
This is what I thought of when I saw those University of Miami players laid out on the field Saturday, after that two-run home run in the bottom of the ninth gave Louisiana State the national championship.
I thought of it, too, Sunday when I read that Suffolk's Nansemond River High School, playing way out in Bristol, had lost the Group AA state title game 7-2.
Always better to get blown out, people say, than to lose at the wire. I second that. As much as the Nansemond River kids hurt on that nine-hour bus ride home, as often as they replayed that seven-run second inning that gave Virginia High a stranglehold, I'll venture that it was nothing next to Miami's return flight. Or our caravan from Ohio to Philadelphia nearly 20 years ago.
It's a nightmare when you're in it, but too many things slowly unravel in a seven-run debacle to leave you slack-jawed. Afterwards, there is time to prepare for the inevitable, to find perspective and rationalization before the deed is done.
Phil Braswell knows it. If there was any blessing to his team's defeat, the Nansemond River coach said, it's that the Warriors weren't jolted into hysterics at the very end.
For a few reasons, Virginia High was the better team that day, Braswell concedes. Twist it and turn it any way you want, Miami will never believe that of LSU. Nor, even when I'm a grandfather, will I believe it in our case.
It hurts. But the Warriors won't necessarily be haunted.
``That's obviously a bigger pill to swallow, what happened to Miami,'' Braswell said. ``Getting down 7-0 early, we knew we were in deep, deep trouble. You could see it every inning by inning.
``It's like if someone in your family dies tonight of a heart attack. You didn't know it was coming. It's that kind of scenario. ... It was easier, but no matter how you look at it, it's still hard.''
Still, the Warriors should find that the high points of this season, their 21-5 record and first state championship appearance in their final Group AA year, will remain in clearer focus than if one swing had clouded everything.
June 8, Omaha is now forever branded in the Hurricanes' minds. And to me, the '77 baseball season means just a few things - how hard we protested when the ump decided it was too dark Sunday evening; how we knew we'd win if we could just keep playing; then a sunny Monday morning, two outs, a high fastball, a rocket shot, shock, tears.
Don't say it. Darn right I've got a life. A good one, with not too many regrets. Here's one:
I wish we'd have lost by 10. ILLUSTRATION: Color file photo
LSU's Warren Morris' home run in the bottom of the ninth Saturday
left Miami shattered. by CNB