Ball State's baseball team begins the 2002 season Friday with weighty expectations placed squarely on its shoulders. According to head coach Rich Maloney, the team is primed to do some major lifting this year - enough to earn it an at-large bid to this year's NCAA tournament.
"We're at the cusp of the national scene," Maloney said. "We need to take it to the next step."
The Cardinals are currently ranked 28th in the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association Division I poll. The team also ranked 37th and 28th in preseason polls by USA Today's Baseball Weekly/ESPN and Collegiate Baseball.
Maloney said he feels his team deserves the recognition, but hopes a tough schedule featuring games against national powerhouses like Notre Dame and reigning national champions Miami (Fla.) will give the Cards a chance of earning an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.
"We've had two teams since I've been here that pretty much anyone would say were NCAA (tournament-level) teams," he said. "Because of the lack of strength in our conference ... we haven't been able to get an at-large bid."
Ball State finished the 2001 season with a 35-23 overall (21-5 MAC) record, but lost the MAC tourney and was not selected to compete in the NCAA tournament.
"If you're a team from the Mid-American Conference, you need to win 40 games (to earn an at-large bid)," Maloney said.
Maloney's quest for national recognition begins this weekend in Birmingham, Ala., as the Cardinals play two games apiece against Eastern Kentucky and last year's NAIA national champions Birmingham-Southern College.
Birmingham-Southern (2-4) is in its first year of competition at the Division I level.
"They went down and played LSU tough in a three-game series a couple weeks ago, so (they're) going to be a challenging opponent," Maloney said.
Eastern Kentucky (25-31, 8-12 Ohio Valley Conference) plays its first game of the season against Birmingham-Southern Friday at noon.
Ball State will count on a veteran pitching staff to shut down opponents this season without senior starter Jason Paul. Paul, who had Tommy John surgery during the off-season, led the team in wins (11) and allowed only three home runs in 96.2 innings pitched in 2001.
Maloney will likely count on a trio of juniors - Brian Bullington, Luke Hagerty and All-American Paul Henry - to anchor a pitching staff that paced the MAC in strikeouts (481), earned run average (4.72), opponents batting average (.274), saves (12), runs allowed (302), earned runs allowed (259) and walks allowed (173).
Bullington, Henry and Hagerty were featured as three of Baseball America's Top 100 Prospects in the class of 2002. Bullington, who led the MAC and set a team record for strikeouts last season (119), was second on the list.
Maloney said he thinks the Cardinals will earn the national recognition he sought for them when he was named head coach in 1995.
"The first goal of the program was to be a factor in the MAC," Maloney said. "Our second goal was to be recognized in the Midwest as one of the premier baseball schools and our third goal was to be nationally recognized."
"I think every program would like to be in that position," he said.
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