OIA Baseball
Rams showed resiliency to overcome outside factors in 2018


 



Sat, Mar 31, 2018 @ [ 11:00 am ]


FINAL 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 R H E
Farrington 0 001200321
Radford 0 4 0101X651

W: Jack Dillon    L: Trey Kaawa    SV: Tommy Tereschuck

RAD: Matthew Lukins 3-4 rbi dbl; Jack Dillon 6.0 IP 3 ER 10 K
FARR: Kamaehu Sanchez 2-2 rbi; Jayden Soriano 3.0 IP 1 ER


Jacob Sur can't recall his Radford baseball team's win-loss record from the 2018 season off the top of his head. What he won't forget about that squad, however, was how it just kept bouncing back.

"I think the biggest thing that sticks out to me about that year was that they were very resilient," said Sur, who has been coaching baseball at his alma mater since 2006, including the last 10-plus as head coach.

The Rams, for the record, went 13-3 overall in 2018 and while they came up a win short of both the league and state championships in Division II that year, they overcame a lot just to get there, to be sure.

The adversity they faced began on March 31st: a Saturday mid-morning game, at home, against an up-and-coming Farrington team.

"That game kind of showed the grit of the team because of the outside factors with it being really rainy," Sur recalled. "I think most teams would have cancelled, but we stuck it out and played and finished. There were five, six times that we had to stop and work on the mound, but it just showed the grit of the team where they didn't let some outside stuff factor into their play and they just pushed through — which goes back to how resilient they were."

Radford entered the game with a 7-0 record and as the lone remaining undefeated team in the Oahu Interscholastic Association's D2 ranks. It had rolled through the competition to that point, winning by an average of more than nine runs per game.

But the Governors, who were 6-1 and coming off of a 9-7 loss to Waianae on Wednesday of that week, were a step-up in competition from what the Rams had faced so far.

"Eric (Tokunaga, Farrington coach) has been doing a great job over there and they had some guys and had been building that program up and they were definitely our first true test in the regular season — and with those elements going on," Sur said.

The Rams, however, had two things going for them. Sur, as he likes to do each year, scheduled a difficult preseason slate for his team, but he also took this particular squad on a week-long, spring break trip to Washington state, where they played a pair of exhibitions games and toured a handful of colleges and universities.

"We went on that trip to Washington the week before and they played in a game that was full-on hailing, so that definitely gave them a little advantage of playing in that element against Farrington. I mean, it's not hailing, but it was definitely pouring, but up there it was also cold, too," Sur said. "It was in the 30s or so, but that was a good trip to get all the guys to kind of jell together. For them to all be together for six, seven days, it was definitely a big team-builder in the aspect of team chemistry."

Furthermore, Sur's squad had another ace up its sleeve in senior Jack Dillon, the team's No. 1 starter and the guy scheduled to get the ball against the Govs — the same team that he tossed a no-hitter against the season prior.

"Jack doesn't have an overpowering fastball — I think it's in the low 80s — and his breaking ball wasn't masterful either, but he's a bulldog on the mound. He's just one of those kids that when he's on the mound, he's got that confidence that he's going to do well, he exhibits it, he demands it and it helps when you pound the zone, especially with high school pitching," Sur said. "If you pound the zone and stay away from giving away free bases and you give your defense a chance to make plays, you'll always be in the game in high school baseball — and Jack was usually 70 to 80 percent of the time throwing strikes in a lot of his games."

Dillon pitched six strong innings of two-hit ball and struck out 10 Farrington batters to lead the way in Radford's 6-3 win at Donald Kimura Field. He threw 114 pitches — he was allowed to exceed the daily limit of 110 because he was mid-count to a batter — and worked through season-highs in runs (3) and walks (5).

"He knew that it was going to be tough that day, that it was going to be a grind because it was wet, really wet and he hardly ever walks guys, but he battled. He would walk a guy and he would come back and pound the zone and get some crucial outs. Our of all of our guys on the team that year, as far as having confidence in that he could get the job done, Jack was the guy," Sur detailed. "Most guys, with those elements, are going to get flustered a little and let those elements take control of him, but he's the one kid on that team that those elements wouldn't be a factor for him, so it was the right guy at the right moment."

What Dillon may have lacked in velocity, he made up for with accuracy and consistency.

"Jack didn't have overpowering stuff, but he pounded the zone and he had a couple pitches he could pound the zone with," Sur added.

Dillon, like so many other players on Sur's teams over the years, is a military-dependent.

"Here at Radford we're about 65 to 70 percent military-dependent kids and I would say that 90 to 95 percent of my kids are military-dependent kids, so it's kind of like a double-edged sword where you rarely get to coach a kid in the program all four years, but from that standpoint it's kind of lucky that we got Jack," Sur said.

Dillon transferred to Radford from Saint Louis School after his sophomore year.

"He came in his junior year and he and another senior, Isaac Grant, they became the catalyst of building the culture of hard work and putting in the work and it showed. You watch them in practice and you see them at the end of practice and they're just full-on dirty," Sur recalled. "They were great seniors to have, because we didn't have much seniors, but those two were guys who pushed the younger guys to get where we needed to be."

But Dillon was just the tip of the spear, as far as starting pitching went for the Rams. Their No. 2 arm, junior righty Richard Akana, proved to be a force to be reckoned with in his own right as he went on to post a 6-0 record and a 0.93 earned-run average that season.

"Richard was that dominant guy — he threw that upper-80s fastball — he had good stuff and he probably would have been the ace, but Jack had the mental advantage," Sur said.

Radford's third starter was freshman Tommy Tereschuck, who put together a 2-2 record with a 2.27 ERA and three saves — including that 6-3 win over Farrington, in which he tossed a perfect seventh inning.

"We usually have maybe one go-to pitcher before that year, but that year we actually had three guys that were pretty dominant. That was very rare in all my years of coaching to have three guys that could come in and handle it and you don't gotta worry about anything because pitching wins baseball games because they always control the game. Offensively, we were alright, but I knew that our pitching would keep us in it," Sur said. "And we played pretty good defense as well."

With the promise that the trio showed from early on in the preseason, Sur and his staff committed to developing those arms — and fortitudes — no matter what.

"We try to play a tough preseason because that's going to give you a true test for the state tournament, especially for Division II it's crucial so that those kids get a taste of being in a battle, so pretty much the whole year, even from the start of preseason that was our philosophy: Jack was our one, Richard was our two, Tommy was out three and no matter what, we tried to get them as many innings and pitches that they could on that day, just so they could be ready for the state tournament because you're playing three days in a row and very seldom do you play three days in a row," Sur said.

Those high-stress situations — much like the one that Sur put him in against the Govs that wet Saturday — were especially important to building up Tereschuck's mental toughness.

"We knew he could do it. Obviously he was still young and you could tell he was still young — there were glimpses of when he didn't have control at certain points — but a big thing in my mind was in the regular season we wanted to make sure that Tommy would get that test because we knew that he would play a crucial role in the state tournament, that he would have to come in in that situation," Sur noted.

He went on, "The plan all along, with our pitching coach, was to make sure those three guys got crucial reps in crucial situations and we didn't falter away from our plan. The regular season is important because it gets you seeding, but your season is not over if you lose in the regular season, but in the playoffs if you have an off-game you're pretty much done, so that was the plan, especially with Tommy because he was a freshman and he didn't have those varsity reps yet, so we wanted to get him as much crucial reps in the preseason and regular season as we could so that he would be ready for the OIA playoffs and the state tournament."

Timely hitting always helps and the Rams got some against Govs that day. All four of their second-inning runs — including Dillon's two-RBI single that made it 3-0 — with two outs.

"Especially with that team a lot of our guys were young, some of our key guys, too and it was a very nice moment to scratch across multiple hits in that two-out situation, because it didn't really come a lot against the more competitive teams," Sur said. "We played a lot of small ball where we would advance guys by sacrificing ourselves, but in that moment, with two outs, you can't do a lot of sacrificing to move guys over and they clutched up in the moment."

It was in the second inning that the weather took a turn for the worse as it rained steadily the rest of the game.

"I think scoring early might have been a factor in that game — especially in that game, just because of the conditions," Sur said.

Dillon, meanwhile, had a no-hitter going until Kamaehu Sanchez's single up the middle led off the fourth inning. He worked out of a jam to limit the damage in the frame and held the Govs to a single run. Dillon also labored through a 35-pitch fifth inning, when he walked three batters to load the bases before giving up his only other hit on the day — an RBI single by Sanchez — followed by a sacrifice to plate another Farrington run.

"Jack still pounded the zone. He rarely lets things faze him, so even in that situation you could still tell that he was confident up there. He had good body language and you could tell that even though it was a tough situation, he wasn't going to let it faze him and he was going to get out of it," Sur explained.

Matthew Lukins collected three of Radford's five hits in the game, including an RBI double, and stole a pair of bases. Michael Guana reached base in all three of his plate appearances — he drew a couple of walks and was hit by a pitch — and came around to score each time.

The win lifted the Rams to 8-0 and solidified their spot atop the OIA D2 standings, while the Govs dropped their second straight to go to 6-2 and fell behind Waianae (6-1) into second place.

However, six days later the Seariders handed Radford a 4-3 defeat. But less than 24 hours after they tasted their first loss, the Rams rebounded with a one-run win over their own, 4-3, over Farrington.

"We beat Farrington and then the next game we lost to Waianae and then we had to come back on that last game and beat Farrington to get that (number) one spot and they did that," Sur said.

Radford and Farrington faced off for a third time that season in the OIA championship at Les Murakami Stadium. But that final meeting went the way of the Govs by a score of 6-4, despite a complete game from Dillon on the mound.

"It's always hard to beat a team three times and Farrington faced Jack before and they had faced Richard, so I think things went their way. They definitely outplayed us, but from our standpoint I think that played a huge part in making us a little bit more hungry for the state tournament because sometimes when you can win and cruise through the playoffs you don't kind don't have that focus and that two weeks in between can drag because of a lack of motivation to win it all, but I think losing the OIA championship game made them more focused and hungry and they understood that at any moment, if they don't do the things they need to do and play well, that anybody can beat them, so it was definitely a big motivator for the guys," Sur explained.

The Rams rode that wave of motivation all the way to the D2 state championship game. Along the way they knocked off second-seeded Kamehameha-Hawaii and third-seeded Kapaa.

"And then we picked the wrong time to have a bad game," Sur lamented.

Radford was held to one hit by Damien in the state final and lost, 12-0. The game was called after the top of the fifth inning due to the mercy rule. It was the first time that the Rams were shutout all season.

"It was awesome for these guys to get through the OIA championship game and get to the state championship game and to play at Les Murakami Stadium twice in a row, but yeah, we picked the wrong time to not play good baseball," Sur added.

He continued, "I think we gave up like 13 free bases with the walks (9) and errors (4) and that's a recipe for disaster, especially when you're playing a good team. If you're giving good teams free bases, it's hard to win, very hard to win and it showed. We gave up too many free bases and they capitalized; Damien was ready to go. They were a very good hitting team and if you get behind against those guys they made you pay, but it was an awesome season for our guys. They were right there on the cusp of winning two championships and they came up short, but a bunch of these guys just came together that year and we put them through the ringer from the fall all the way through the spring and they came together and they did their thing."

Sur, a class of 2000 graduate of Radford, led the team to an OIA D2 title in 2011, his first season as head coach. He's about to embark on his 11th season this spring. The OIA will play a seven-game schedule with no postseason beginning Apr. 24 and running through May 15.

"These guys haven't been playing for a full year so they're definitely excited to get back out there and it's showing," Sur said after his team hosted Kamehameha for a scrimmage Saturday.

"We've played three scrimmages already against ILH teams and you can just see the excitement for these guys to get back out there," he added. "Even though it's not going to be the same as before where there's a playoff and state tournament, but these guys definitely appreciate that they're just getting the ability to play again, which is awesome because a lot of these guys have been putting in so much work and having their season cut last year was very hard for a lot of them, but they've been working throughout the year even though they didn't know if they were going to be playing or not, to stick to it even though there was no guarantee that there would be a season and now that they're getting it, it's a little reward for sticking it out all year."

The Rams, who will once again be in D2 for the 2021 season, open against Kalaheo on Apr. 24.

-ScoringLive reporter Stacy Kaneshiro contributed to this report.



Reach Kalani Takase at [email protected].




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