Stanford's postseason baseball Stanford's postseason baseball (May 28, 2003)hopes look super right now

by Rick Eymer

For the record, the fifth-ranked Stanford baseball team officially won the Pac-10 title by two games over Arizona State and three games over Washington.

It's possible the Cardinal, who completed the regular season with a nonconference sweep of visiting Cal Poly, could wind up playing ASU, Washington or even Arizona again before the postseason has run its course.

All four Pac-10 teams begin regional play this weekend.

Stanford, which earned the No. 6 national seed, and Arizona State each host a regional.

Stanford (41-15) hosts its eighth consecutive regional, and will attempt to earn its fifth consecutive trip to the College World Series, and sixth in the past seven years.

The Cardinal open on Friday at 6 p.m. against No. 4 seed Illinois-Chicago (39-16). That will be preceded by No. 3 UC Riverside (40-15) and No. 2 Richmond (46-13) at 2 p.m.

Washington (40-16) is the third seed at Long Beach and will meet Minnesota (39-20) in a first-round game. Long Beach State and Pepperdine are also in the regional.

The winners of the Long Beach and Stanford regionals will meet in the Super Regional beginning June 6 at the highest remaining seed.

Arizona (30-21) meets Notre Dame in the first round of the Fullerton regional. Fullerton and San Diego play in the other first-round contest.

Arizona State (50-12) hosts Central Connecticut State (31-15-2) in the first round, while New Mexico State and UNLV also play in Tempe.

Stanford has played in the postseason every year beginning in 1994, and carries an overall mark of 58-21 in 20 appearances under coach Mark Marquess.

Stanford had clinched the conference title against UCLA the previous week, and celebrated with its sweep of Cal Poly. The Cardinal won Sunday, 8-4, after beating the Mustangs 12-0 on Saturday and 9-4 on Friday.

Friday's fireworks-enhanced crowd of 4,017 was the largest of the season for Stanford.

Stanford has won 13 of its past 14 games heading into regional play.

"We earned the right to host an NCAA Regional by winning the Pac-10 championship and having the type of regular season that we did playing against some very tough competition both within our league and in our nonconference schedule," said Marquess. "It will be good for our players and our fans to be hosting an NCAA Regional, and it's just nice to play at home."

The regional at Sunken Diamond will begin with two games on Friday at 2 p.m. and 6 p.m. Three games will be played on Saturday (11 am, 3 pm, 7 pm), with the regional championship scheduled for Sunday at 1 p.m., and 5 p.m. if necessary.

All session passes for the event are on sale at the Stanford Ticket Office or by calling 1-800-STANFORD. Prices for all session passes are $50 (Reserved), $35 (Adult General Admission) and $20 (Child/Senior/Student General Admission).

Single game tickets will be available on the day of the game only. Prices for single game tickets are $15 (Reserved), $12 (General Admission Adult) and $8 (Child/Senior/Student General Admission).

"We had a phenomenal regular season," said Marquess. "The NCAA playoffs are like a whole new season, but I think we're ready for it."

The University of Illinois at Chicago qualified for the NCAA tournament by beating Butler, 2-1, in the championship game of the Horizon League tournament.

Chuck Peters was named the conference Player of the Year after hitting .361 with 10 homers and 52 RBI. Mike Hughes hit .376 with 45 RBI this year. Freshman pitcher Ryan Martin was named the Horizon League Newcomer of the Year.

"What a great experience," UIC coach Mike Dee said. "We deserved it, we have some guys that have worked so hard for four years."

Richmond won the Atlantic-10 title to gain the automatic bid into the tournament. The Spiders won the Winston-Salem regional last year but lost to Nebraska in the Super regional.

Richmond has three quality pitchers in Tim Stauffer (9-4, 1.87), Mike McGirr (9-1, 2.48) and Jason Bolinski (9-1, 2-58).

Offensively the Spiders are led by Ben Zeslind (.379) and Jiam Fasano (.353-10-63).

Riverside, in its second season at the Division I level, swept Cal State Fullerton in a three-game series earlier this season. The team is led by pitchers AJ Shappi (11-2, 3.14) and Jaymie Torres (10-2, 3.36). Ryan Harvey hit .409 this year, and Tony Festa leads the team with 51 RBI.

On Sunday, Stanford's Chris Carter collected two hits, including a home run, and drove in two run. Sam Fuld had two hits to extend his hit streak to 14 games, and Ryan Garko also had a pair of hits.

Garko, a Pac-10 Player-of-the-Year candidate and Johnny Bench Award national semifinalist, finished the regular season with a .406 batting average to go with new career-highs of 15 homers and 78 RBI. He is attempting to become just the sixth player in Stanford baseball history to hit over .400 in a season and the first since David McCarty batted .420 in 1991. His 78 RBI currently rank him fifth on Stanford's single-season list, 14 shy of the 92 runs driven in by school record holder Rick Lundblade in 1985.

"I'm pretty excited about us hosting the NCAA Regional," said Garko. "It was our goal to win the Pac-10 championship and get an opportunity to do this. It's really important to be playing your best baseball heading into the postseason, and I think we're doing that right now."

Fuld now ranks ninth on Stanford's all-time hit list with 273 and has a .355 career batting average, fifth in the school's record book.

Stanford starter Tim Cunningham (3-3) was awarded the victory due to a predetermined pitching rotation, scattering two hits and one run with a pair of strikeouts in the first three innings. Cunningham's victory improved his career record to 24-8.

Stanford finished the regular season with a 24-10 record at Sunken Diamond and was 23-9 in non-conference games.

Stanford defeated Cal Poly for the seventh straight time and improved to 43-5 in the all-time series between the teams since 1949.

Mark Romanczuk (10-0) became the first Pac-10 pitcher to reach double figures in wins on Saturday. Matt Manship recorded his eighth save to move into a tie for the Pac-10 lead and secure Stanford's fourth shutout of the season.

Garko, who went 4-for-4, continued his phenomenal season by setting a new single-season career-high with his 15th homer. Tobin Swope and John Hester also hit their first career home runs in the victory.

"Ryan Garko has had the best year of his career this season and has really carried us offensively," said Marquess.

Danny Putnam added three hits, including two doubles, and drove in two runs. Sam Fuld tripled in the first, his 15th career triple, moving him into a tie for fourth on Stanford's all-time list. In addition, Fuld was hit twice and stole a base.

Romanczuk struck out eight batters while allowing just four hits and one walk over the first six innings before Manship limited the Mustangs to two hits with two strikeouts over the final three innings.

"It's nice and almost kind of a relief to get that 10th win," said Romanczuk, who came out of his last start with a 5-3 lead in the ninth inning before taking a no-decision in Stanford's 9-5 loss in 12 innings to UCLA on May 17.

The only pitcher in Stanford history to finish a season with a perfect record with more than 10 decisions is Sandy Vance, who recorded an 11-0 mark in 1967.

John Hudgins (9-3) picked up the victory by limiting the Mustangs to one unearned run and three hits over the first six innings.