After watching his baseball team strike out 17 times in the midst of a complete game shutout by Gettysburg pitcher Brian Spicer last Friday, Hopkins' head coach Bob Babb had only one word to describe the experience.
"When someone is pitching that well, that's the only time as a manager that you feel helpless," he said.
With two double-headers this weekend against conference squads, that feeling of helplessness probably won't subside for Babb.
Not only do the Jays have to win all four games in order to keep their hopes of winning the conference and heading into the Centennial playoffs as a No. 1 seed, but Franklin & Marshall, the winners of eight straight games, will have to split their doubleheader against Dickinson.
"That loss to Gettysburg really killed us," senior second baseman Corey Gleason said, "but we're still in a good position to go far in the playoffs."
Echoing that spirit, the Jays rebounded from the blanking at Gettysburg with a solid win on Tuesday night against Montclair State, improving their overall record to 24-6-2. Unlike their previous game, the Jays were able to get some offensive momentum going, and rallies in the third and sixth innings provided them with the run production they needed to manage an 8-2 victory.
"We had two innings where we scored three runs, and scoring runs was nice because we hadn't been doing that well lately," Gleason said.
The 4-0 loss to Gettysburg came on the heels of another tough defeat, as two days earlier, Hopkins fell to Shenandoah 8-7 after sophomore right-hander Paul Martone gave up a walk-off single to center field in the 12th inning. According to senior leftfielder Bryce Baumann, losing two-straight games for just the second time this season didn't damage team morale but actually had a positive effect.
"I think it refocused us," he said. "It made us realize we weren't quite on the level we wanted to be at that point in the season. I'm glad we're back on a winning track with four games left in the season."
In the non-conference game against Montclair State, Babb made sure not to overwork any members of his pitching team, and pulled his starter, senior lefty Jim Flannery, after just two innings of work. Flannery struck out two and surrendered one run, but because the Jays scored three runs at the top of the third, he was able to pick up an easy win, making him 6-1 on the season.
After pulling Flannery, Babb gave two-inning shifts to senior right-hander Jason Thayer and sophomore right-hander Ryan Kuhlman, the other two members of his trio of untouchable starters. Thayer struck out two and surrendered three hits and a run, while Kuhlman silenced the Red Hawk bats, allowing zero hits, and fanning four.
With his aces' arms rested and strong going into the final stretch of the regular season, Babb will hope to see his starters dominate opposing batters just as they have all season. But even if they can summon some lights-out pitching, Babb emphasized that the Jays won't make it far into the postseason unless the other members of the team can provide five-tool consistency.
"We need to cut down the number of strikeouts [at bat], put the ball in play more, and we need to make all the plays in the field," he said.
Baumann agreed with Babb's statement that explosive offensive numbers and strong pitching won't be enough for their team, and that they will need to focus on the small things in order to win the big games.
"We'll need to make less mental and physical errors in the field and on the bases if we want to do well in the upcoming doubleheaders and the postseason," he said.
Gleason, on the other hand, remained confident that despite the two losses, the Jays are back up to speed and will be ready to play postseason-quality ball when the time comes.
"We hit a little skid for a bit but we're working back to where we need to be," he said.
Though it might seem like an exaggeration to call two fairly well-played losses a "skid," the last time the Jays lost two straight was March 20 and 21, during their spring training trip in Arizona. The Jays lost a close, eight-inning 11-10 game to the powerhouse College of New Jersey, and the next day dropped a 10-5 seven-inning loss to Augsburg.
After a non-conference home game on Thursday against Mary Washington, the Blue Jays will travel to Allentown, Pa. to face Muhlenberg on Saturday. The Jays will have to make sure they aren't distracted by the fact that 100 miles away in Carlisle, Pa., the results of the doubleheader between Franklin & Marshall and Dickinson will determine whether Hopkins will be able to control their destiny and get a shot at claiming the No. 1 seed.
Though Franklin & Marshall isn't nationally ranked -- unlike the Jays, who were given the No. 12 spot in the April 18 ABCA/Collegiate Baseball Newspaper poll -- they currently have a 1.5-game lead in the Centennial Conference.
The Jays will then return home on Sunday for their last two conference games against Ursinus, which will begin at 12:30 p.m.
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