When the Western Nevada Wildcats punched their ticket to the JUCO World Series last week, thoughts for many fans flooded in from 2007 when an extremely talented Wildcats team made the school's first appearance in the series.
Although that team was just the second WNC squad in the school's history, it went 41-24-2 and won eight straight games to win the region and district titles, much like this year's team did. They won two more to start the World Series, and finished fifth in the country.
The 2007 team had four players drafted " three signed " and three more accept Division I scholarships. But most importantly, it was a team that bonded together during the run, and has continued to stay tight.
"That group of guys that we had was by far the best team that I've been on, period," said Stephen Sauer, who went on to pitch for Arizona State and is currently playing in the Chicago White Sox organization. "We all had the same situation in high school where we were kind of overlooked by all the other programs and that was the main thing that bonded us together."
That bond is similar to the one the current crop of Wildcats have. Many of them were originally passed over by the higher profile D-I schools only to have six of them commit to those types of programs this year. The situations that the group in 2007 faced are much like the one the Wildcats face in the JUCO World Series, which begins at 8 a.m. today when the Wildcats face top-ranked Howard (57-1) in the opening game of the double-elimination tournament. So it is no wonder that WNC coach D.J. Whittemore brought in one of the players from the previous World Series team to talk to this group before they left for Grand Junction, Colo., on Wednesday.
"I just basically told them enjoy it, enjoy the environment, stay together, play as a team because that's what it comes down to at this point in the year, who is going to be the best team?" said Kyle Bounderant, who was an infielder on the previous World Series team. "It's not who's going to have the best guy, but who's going to have the best team."
The 2007 team is considered the school's best team thus far with the bulk of talent coming from the pitching staff. Cole Rohrbough posted a 10-3 record with a 1.73 earned run average and was drafted by the Atlanta Braves in the 22nd round. Sauer elected to go to baseball powerhouse Arizona State after being selected in the 31st round by the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and then was taken in the 10th round in last year's draft. Justin Garcia went 11-5 and was drafted by the Devil Rays in the 25th round. TJ Wohlever was selected by the Braves in the 32nd round.
That group, many of the players and coaches said, was the reason the Wildcats were able to make the run that they did. When asked if this year's pitching staff compares to the 2007 squad, Bondurant said that was unfair comparison.
"I always said that I didn't think that I'd ever see a pitching staff like the one that we had," Bounderant said. "But they've got some guys that can just flat out pitch (on this year's team). They gave Kramer Champlin a spot start in the middle of the season and he throws a no-hitter? They're very deep. They have guys that haven't thrown a lot this year that come in and get a lot of people out and that's what I think is really scary about this team because they're not just as deep as what they've thrown."
This year's team has six members of its pitching staff that have logged less than 20 innings in conference play, but that have proved they are capable of stepping into bigger roles.
Jake Waardenburg tossed just 19.2 innings this season, but in the Western District title game against Central Arizona, the freshman held the middle of the Vaqueros' order to one run on two hits in 1.1 innings.
"Waardenburg was awesome," Whittemore said after the game. "He came in chucking pellets and hitting the mitt. I would have liked to score those two runs from second and third and get him a win.
"The reality is we've got five other guys just like Jake Waardenburg who have been working their tail off, keeping their head and waiting for their chance and they'll be ready if they get their chance."
Two of those guys " Kyle Starratt (TCU) and Logan Odom (USC) " have already signed D-I scholarships.
The Wildcats haven't fallen prey to distractions this year, despite having finals the week of the district tournament and trying to make the adjustment from wood to aluminum bats. That type of experience could be an important one going into Grand Junction where there could be more than 10,000 fans and scouts on hand to watch them play.
"The one thing that I'll never forget is when we first stepped out onto the field to get infield/outfield (practice) and I remember we had the opening night game and we look around and there's 10,000 people in the stands and it was just so overwhelming at the moment," Bounderant said. "It was just so surreal. But then we got focused back up and we just kind of had to realize that we're playing baseball and that's all we were doing."