Fresh off the second-longest college baseball game in NCAA history – a 23-inning victory over William and Mary on May 16, 2014 – the College of Charleston baseball team is gearing up for a run at a conference championship later this week.
The College Today asked head coach Monte Lee to share his thoughts on the regular season, the historic game and his expectations for the Cougars’ first Colonial Athletic Conference tournament.
Q: What was it like to have coached and been part of a history-making, 23-inning game that lasted more than six hours?
A: It was phenomenal. It is surreal. It doesn’t really sink in right after the game what just happened.
There’s only been two other games in NCAA Division I history that have played 23 innings. We tied for the second longest game. (Note: Texas and Boston College played 25 innings in the 2009 NCAA tournament. In 1971, Louisiana-Lafayette beat McNeese State in 23 innings.)
The Cougars celebrate after winning a 23-inning game over William and Mary on May 16, 2014.
A neat part, as in a lot of cases in baseball, is when you look at the stats: We played 23 innings, and we walked one batter, which kind of tells you how good our pitching staff is when it comes to throwing strikes.
I brought in my left fielder Brandon Murray in the tenth inning, and he was 4 for 5. He had five at bats from the 10th inning on.
Eric Bauer, who just won National Pitcher of the Week, threw 10 innings in relief and 111 pitches. I don’t know if that’s ever been done before.
RELATED: Read a behind-the-scenes account of the 23-inning game.
Q: How many extra-inning games did you play this season?
A: We’ve played five extra-inning games in the last three weeks. We played a whole weekend series against Bethune-Cookman (on April 26 & 27, 2014) and won in three consecutive extra-inning games.
We played the second longest game in College of Charleston history last Tuesday (May 13, 2014) against Coastal Carolina. That went 12 innings, and that game was six minutes away from being the longest game in CofC history.
It was really taxing from a pitching standpoint. It’s been a pretty cool thing. This team has done some things.
Q: You had some apprehension at the beginning of the season about how your team would compete in the CAA. You were picked in the pre-season to finish second, and that’s exactly where you finished the regular season. Are you happy with that?
Monte Lee
A: We are playing with 24 active players and we had 33 at the beginning of the year. That’s how many injuries we’ve had. It’s been a cool group. It really has.
We are pitching a sophomore and two freshmen. So we have a young pitching staff, which obviously bodes well for the future.
We lost 72 percent of the innings pitched from last year’s staff. I’ve never had a year where I lost that many pitchers at one time … to go into a season with the uncertainty of starting that many new guys. Our four main starters are all in their first year here, so we had no idea what to expect. We knew they were talented, but we didn’t know what was going to happen.
We had to sweep William and Mary to win the regular season title. We won the first two and lost the last game. William and Mary had had a rainout in conference play and only played 20 league games. We played 21. They finished 15-5; we finished 15-6. Had they played the regular amount of games we would have won the league because we would have had the tiebreaker. We had all of the great things happen and the only bad thing that happened was something we couldn’t control.
Some pretty cool feats have happened individually and as a team. We’ve won a lot of games. It hasn’t always been pretty. We may win ugly, but an ugly win is a lot better than a beautiful loss.
Q: What are your expectations heading into the conference tournament? (The Cougars have a first-round bye and will face the winner of the UNCW/James Madison game in the tournament’s second round on Thursday, May 22, 2014.)
A: We feel good simply because we feel like we have the best pitching staff in the league. We’ve led the league in defense; we’ve led the league in pitching. So if we continue to play at a high level, we feel like we’ve got a chance to win it. But we’ve got to win the first one. You’ve got to stay in that winner’s bracket.
RELATED: Read more about the Cougars’ historic 23-inning game at CofCSports.com.
