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Underdog Javelinas prove they are best |
 By Juan Carlos Reyes Editor The South Texan |
Last week, I had a quick chat with Javelina baseball catcher Joe Hamon to wish him good luck at the Lone Star Conference Tournament. He shook his head and said, “We’re not going to last long.”
Completely dumbfounded with his negativity I responded by saying that if the New York Giants can beat the unbeaten New England Patriots in the Super Bowl, than the baseball team could come through in the tournament.
Hamon still was unsure, but guess what? Not only did the baseball team do well in the tournament, they won the whole thing after beating the No. 4 ranked Abilene Christian Wildcats.
Jaime Gonzalez and I were watching the game case from Abilene Christian University’s athletic website. We caught the game at the halfway point and we were in awe seeing how closet he game was in the fourth inning with the game tied 1-1.
After Abilene Christian’s Thomas Bumpass hit an RBI-single putting the Wildcats up 2-1, Jaime and I did not give up on the team. Apparently neither did the team. They came back to take the lead 3-2.
I was pretty excited, but not as excited as Jaime who decided to pace back-and-forth.
However, when Abilene Christian, rebounded by tying the game of the seventh and then taking over in the eighth, almost all hope was lost between Jaime and myself.
I gave up hope after giving Joe those words of encouragement. Although, we still had the bottom of the eighth and possibly the bottom of the ninth, it looked like we were done.
Oh how naive we were. When the Javelinas scored four runs in the bottom of the eight, we both got excited.
The top of the ninth inning was nerve-wracking. Although we regained the lead, Jaime and I were aware of how good Abilene Christian is. The Javelinas didn’t get that memo and shut them down in the ninth to win the game. I never thought that of all the teams that we have on this campus that our baseball team would make a national tournament.
After hearing Sports Information Director Sean Johnson say almost every cliche in the book, the realization that the baseball team actually made it into the NCAA Division II National Championship Tournament was real.
The team were the biggest underdogs coming into this LSC Tournament. In fact, they came in with an overall record of less than .500. The fight they prepared for ended in a full-on knockout against teams that were more favored to win.
I knew they had a lot of potential to at least make the conference tournament, but to win it is FAN-Tastic. So here’s to the Javelina baseball team for winning the first conference title since 2004. I wish you guys all the luck and to keep your head up… especially you Joe.