Gene's Blog: Baseball outpowers a Power 5, continues surge

Tommie Baseball's 6-0 win over Minnesota on Tuesday night at the U of M's Siebert Field won't quite go down as an ESPN moment.

You could potentially call Tuesday's result, however, an ESP moment.

Whether you call it "Extra Sensory Perception," or simply faith in the process, this victory is the latest evidence that Tommie Athletics is building a solid foundation for the future.

Both St. Thomas diamond teams are showing what a lot of commitment and a little confidence can do when opportunity arises. Tommie Softball has a win over a top-25 ranked team in South Florida, and has had a few impressive comeback victories of its own.

Transition

During the Division III era, most Tommie teams were accustomed to winning 70-75 percent of their games and landing in the national rankings.

But this year's move into Division I required revised goals and expectations on the fields, diamonds, rinks and courts.

Put another way, it's meant fewer days as the Roadrunner... and more days as the steamrolled Coyote.

You notice it in news releases and recaps on Tommiesports.com. In the MIAC/D-III era, there were team highlights galore plus a run of conference and region individual awards. So far in 2021-22, instead of MVPs, we occasionally have to highlight some MVs -- Moral Victories.

An "MV" is when your men's hockey team leads No. 1-ranked Minnesota State 2-1 in the third period of an eventual 3-2 loss. Or when your Women's Hockey plays the defending NCAA champion Wisconsin to a 2-1 score into the final 30 seconds of the game. Another MV is when Baseball drops one-run road decisions to Big Ten teams Iowa, Northwestern and Minnesota -- all games the Tommies led in the seventh, eighth or ninth innings.

Breakthrough Night

Before last Tuesday, Gopher Baseball had won 20 of the previous 22 meetings with the Purple, including 12-0 and 2-1 victories earlier in 2022. Only St. Thomas wins in 2009 and 2011 broke up that streak.

And coming into this week, St. Thomas teams had a combined record of 0-30-1 this school year in games and exhibition clashes against all Power 5 members. Most of those came in hockey, but there were others from volleyball, baseball, softball, basketball, soccer and tennis. That included an 0-12 school-year record against Minnesota.

Thus April 19, 2022 goes into the archives as the date when a Tommie team outpowered a Power 5.

The star was sophomore pitcher Kolby Gartner, who handed the Gophers their first shutout loss of 2022 and only their second on-campus shutout defeat in seven seasons. His three-hitter with nine strikeouts also goes down as the program's first complete game in Division I.

Another of the Tommies' D-III guys with D-I stuff, Gartner showed grit as a freshman last May in an NCAA D-III playoff elimination game against Chapman with eight scoreless innings. A two-out throwing error in the top of the ninth cost him a shutout and led to three runs, but the Toms walked off Chapman later in the inning. The Purple went on to win the regional tourney and claim a second-place NCAA finish.

Gartner is no stranger to pressure. His other on-campus job? He's the starting punter for Glenn Caruso's football team.

The guy who lost his senior baseball season at St. Michael-Albertville in 2020 due to the Covid shutdown came into this game 0-2 with a 5.85 ERA, with his longest stint of the season 4 2-3 innings. But he was calm and in control. He allowed a leadoff single in the first inning, then retired 18 of the next 21 Gophers to help make some history.

"I felt just OK at the beginning, then around the third inning is really when I started feeling my groove," Gartner said. "I found an inner peace. I was in a good space and didn't really think about anything else.

"It's a good feeling to win against Minnesota, our whole team is starting to come together. There have been a lot of ups and downs this season, so tonight was one of the ups. We've had a lot of one-run, two-run losses. We just have to stick in there and find a way to win more of those."

Coming in 0-5 on the season vs. Big Ten teams, the Toms didn't flinch. They posted nine hits and six runs in the second, third and fourth innings alone. They also made it six consecutive games without a defensive error, helping them move among the top 12 teams in fielding among all 301 D-I programs at .981.

Fifth-year Kyle Halverson continued his torrid batting streak in April with a two-run homer and an RBI single. In his last eight games, Halverson is batting .424 with six home runs among 14 hits, plus 12 RBI and 10 runs. After hitting only six home runs in his first 121 college games (four in 100 D-III games), the Shoreview, Minn., native has hit six in his last eight outings.

Team Turnaround?

After a 1-15 road record to start the season, St. Thomas has recorded three away wins in a row. Impressive for a team that has taken 15 one or two-run losses, has an 0-4 record in extra innings, and seven walk-off losses.

Olean said no matter the opponent or conditions, his guys have a resilience and a competitive attitude that's helped them find their footing.

"I made a point at Monday's practice to try compliment our guys, as I know I was feeling the frustration," the coach explained. "We had a (10-inning) walk-off loss (to Tarleton State) in Texas on Friday. We played a pretty good game, we were so close to winning in the ninth inning, but we just couldn't close it out.

"But then we came back in game two and won a really competitive game. A lot of our guys you could say were unsung heroes with the way they all stepped up. Then we came back the next day and had a very business-like win.

"They are starting to figure out that they can win these games if we do a few things. It doesn't mean we will be perfect, we are going to have some off games, too. But we're not outclassed. The guys are still grinding, they're still getting after it, they are still believing, they're still trying to get better. It's a different type of role this year as a new Division I program, but they are starting to understand."

The Purple didn't fold after starting out with a 4-17 record that included just a .205 team batting clip. Over the last eight games, St. Thomas is 4-4, with just one error, three terrific games from starting pitchers, and a team batting average of .272 in those eight. It played conference leader North Dakota State even over three games and 27 innings; won two of three at Tarleton State; and split two with the Gophers.

There are 20 games to go, starting with a home weekend set with Northern Colorado at Koch Diamond.

Plenty more chances to be the Roadrunner, and avoid being the steamrolled Coyote.

Action photo

Kolby Gartner

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Gene's Blog is a sports column penned by Tommie sports information director Gene McGivern. Gene is working his 28th season at St. Thomas and 34th overall working with college athletics teams. He blogs periodically on various topics regarding the Tommies and college sports.

If you have comments or questions, e-mail Gene at ejmcgivern@stthomas.edu

University of St. Thomas Athletics

Gene's Blog: Baseball outpowers a Power 5, continues surge

Players Mentioned

Kolby Gartner

Kyle Halverson

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