The Trinity baseball team's goal at the start of the regular season was to play well enough to secure a spot in the conference tournament. As it turns out, it accomplished far more.
With a doubleheader sweep of Wesleyan on May 3, the Bantams moved to 34-0 and became the first Div. III baseball team in the modern era to finish an undefeated regular season. On top of that, the Bantams downed the Amherst Lord Jeffs 11-8 on May 11 to capture the NESCAC championship and improve to a perfect 37-0 overall. The victory netted Trinity an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.
"We had three goals at the start of the season," sophomore first baseman Kent Graham said. "The first was to win the NESCAC Tournament, the second was to win the New England Regional and the third was to win the College World Series."
The Bantams, a team that failed to qualify for the NESCAC Tournament the previous two seasons, entered the season hoping to play well enough to host the event come May. The team, ranked No. 3 nationally as of May 5, opened its season on the road, winning 11 games against non-conference opponents down in Ft. Myers, Fla. But even with the early-season success, coach Bill Decker says the thought of going undefeated didn't enter his mind until significantly later.
"To be honest, I didn't even think about it until the final weekend when we played Wesleyan," he said. "No coach thinks his team will go undefeated [at the start of the season]. But if we were 33-1 or 32-3, that's still a pretty darn good season."
The strength of the Bantams this season has been their pitching, which leads the nation with a 1.86 ERA, led by four of the league's top five pitchers. Trinity surrendered more than five runs in a game just three times over the course of the regular season, and senior Tim Kiely, now 8-0 with three shutouts, led the conference in innings pitched with 62.0 and strikeouts with 66.
"Our pitching has been absolutely amazing," Graham said. "Anytime you can throw a pitcher out there and know he's going to limit the other team to one or two runs, it makes it a lot easier on us hitters because we don't have to press in our at-bats."
Despite Kiely's impressive strikeout numbers, the pitching staff has been characterized more by its efficiency than its overpowering fastballs, as it surrenders just 2.15 walks per game.
"Our pitchers do a great job of being aggressive in the strike zone," Decker said. "They pitch strong in the zone when we get ahead in the count. We try to keep the game moving and not give the other team three chances at the ball."
Trinity also deploys a powerful offense, which is first in the conference with 31 home runs and second with a .338 batting average. The Bantams have also been remarkably consistent, scoring double digits in runs in 19 games.
The Bantams' toughest non-conference matchup of the year came April 22 against Eastern Connecticut State, a team from the Little East Conference that was ranked No. 7 in the preseason national rankings. But Trinity handled the Warriors with ease, blazing past them 17-2 behind hits from 10 different Bantam batters.
"That was one of those games you get up for because they're good every year," Graham said. "After we won that game big, it gave us confidence because we knew we could throw our best pitcher out against our opponent's best pitcher and we'd win."
Three days earlier, the Bantams had played their most nail-biting game of the season, a come-from-behind victory at Tufts on April 13. Down 8-1 heading into the sixth inning, Trinity rallied, tying the game on a grand slam from catcher Sean Killeen before eventually winning 17-10 in extra innings.
"That was the one game where we can look back and say, 'How did we win?'" Graham said.
With the team's success has come a slew of media attention, including a feature in the New York Times on April 22. But in spite of all the attention, Decker maintains that the team has not lost its focus.
"I think our kids have really handled it the right way," he said. "They've worked hard and we haven't had the internal problems of someone complaining. The fact that we have eight seniors helps. And frankly, we've stayed healthy. The attention has been nice, but it hasn't changed who we are."
While the success has certainly been celebrated by the team around campus, Decker maintains that the core philosophy of his program has stayed the same.
"We've tried to play one day at a time," he said. "We make sure we're ready to play every day. But you also have to let kids live their lives and take care of their responsibilities. We've had some good games and some battles and the ball has bounced our way."
"I'm sure at the end of the season we'll look back," Graham added. "Right now we're concentrating on winning some more regional games. But I'm sure at the end of the season we'll look back and say, 'Wow.'"
