Britons bats come out hot as Florida sun
Albion’s hitting gets off to scorching start on spring break trip

March 26, 2004
by Jake Lloyd
Sports Editor

The scoreboard read 21-13. It could’ve passed for a football score or even a middle-school basketball score.

But that wasn’t the case. It was the score of the Albion College baseball team’s victory over Muskingum College (Ohio) during its spring break trip to Cape Coral and Fort Myers, Fla. Although the Britons finished the trip just 5-5, they put on an amazing hitting display in many of their games.

Albion entered the bottom of the fifth inning against Muskingum trailing by a seemingly insurmountable 13-2 score. However, the Britons were far from done. After a five-run fifth inning cut the deficit to 13-7, the Britons scored an amazing 14 runs in the sixth inning.

“It was a lot of fun to see happen,” said third baseman Mike Cieszkowski, Howell senior, who added that everybody who came to the plate that inning expected to get a hit.

It was an exciting afternoon in Florida. As the comeback continued, Little Leaguers, who were gathering for the next game on the field, starting watching and cheering on the Britons.

That scoring outburst wasn’t the only fun Albion’s batters had down south. The Britons scored 10 or more runs in four games and at least five runs in seven games. The team batted .342 for the trip, with seven players hitting better than .400 from the plate.

Albion’s 83 runs scored in its first 10 games is more than half of the 160 runs it scored in 35 games last season.

Cieszkowski, who has played for the Britons all four of his years at Albion, has never seen the Britons hit better.

“This is probably the best we’ve hit all the way through the lineup,” he said.

Although first-year coach Scott Carden believes that one of the reasons the Britons have hit so well this season is because it takes a little while for teams’ pitchers to find their grooves, he also believes that the players taking a lot of swings in practice has been beneficial.

The Britons have practiced hitting at nearly every practice, and Cieszkowski said that practices have been a lot more structured and disciplined with Carden at the helm.

The Britons have also worked on situational hitting, such as hitting to the opposite field to advance a runner or laying down a sacrifice bunt.

Albion’s work in practice paid off in its second game of the season, against Beloit College (Wisc.), when pinch-hitter Matt Shook, Coldwater senior, entered a 9-9 game in the bottom of the sixth and won it with a well-executed suicide squeeze to score the game-winning run from third base.

Albion’s explosive offense makes life much easier for its pitchers. Starting pitcher Jon Hastings, Fort Gratiot junior, said that when he is given an early lead, his pitching approach changes. Instead of pitching carefully and keeping the ball away from batters—which sometimes results in walking them—like he does in close games, Hastings can attack the strike zone when he has a lead.

“You can challenge hitters more,” Hastings said. “Every time you’re a starting pitcher and your team scores three runs in the top half for you, it’s a lot of pressure off because you just have to throw strikes and not worry about getting everybody out all the time. It’s a huge relief.”

The only reason Albion doesn’t have a great record to boast about is because of its inability to put complete games together. In many games the hitting has been spectacular while the pitching has been mediocre. In other games the pitching has been stellar while the hitting has not been so explosive.

“It’s been one of those tough situations just because we still haven’t had everything click on most days,” Carden said after the Florida trip. “It can be a pretty exciting time when the team starts coming around and everything starts clicking at the same time.”

Albion played its toughest competition of the season in Florida, and left with a decent record. One of the Britons’ victories came against then No. 13-ranked Ohio Wesleyan College.

Albion’s hitting cooled down a bit this past weekend at the Rose-Hulman Invitational in Terre Haute, Ind. The Britons scored more than one run in just one of their four games, in which they went 2-2.

However, if the Britons can get solid pitching from their trio of starters—Hastings, David Seales, Alma junior, and Steve Gordon, Plymouth senior—and continue to put runs on the board, on a consistent basis, the players believe they can accomplish great things in the Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association.

“If we can hit and pitch, we definitely can compete for the league,” Hastings said. “If our hitting continues and we’re getting four or five runs a game, I think our pitching’s good enough to win league games all the time.”