Complete CWS Index

By John Manuel
June 20, 2003

By John Manuel

OMAHA--From the outside looking in, it's a matchup better suited for a trivia contest or SAT comparison rather than a national championship.

For those who know college baseball, the academics make a decent angle, but the College World Series title matchup between Rice and Stanford, whose best-of-three series begins Saturday, matches teams ranked second and third in the preseason that were supposed to get here. It's the traditional power Stanford against the recently empowered Rice, with a national championship at stake.

Stanford has been to the CWS five years in a row and has won at least two games in each case. Rice, making its fourth appearance in its history and all in the last seven years, has won four Series games over that span, three of them this year. But players from both teams acknowledged they have followed the other during the season, and Rice's players actually saw Stanford play against UCLA during a West Coast trip in May.

"We were out there playing San Jose State and so we went over to watch them," Rice junior outfielder Chris Kolkhorst said. "It was a Friday game against UCLA, and they won big."

Asked the same question, Owls sophomore righthander Wade Townsend added, "(John) Hudgins dealt. He was dirty. I'm glad we probably won't see him for a couple of days. Stanford looked good."

Tale of the Tape STANFORD RICE .320 Batting Average .313 .498 Slugging .443 .391 On-Base .398 149 Doubles 127 72 Home Runs 51 240 Walks 288 314 Strikeouts 353 67-85 SB-Attempts 72-103 .972 Fielding Pct. .980 3.95 ERA 2.73 606/556 IP/H Ratio 603/482 226 BB Allowed 210 467 Strikeouts (Pitching) 640 .245 Opp. BA .221 61 HR Allowed 33

The Cardinal players haven't seen Rice outside of the CWS, and what they have seen has been impressive. But neither team is awe-struck by the opponent or situation. That question was especially asked of Stanford because of Rice's rested duo of Townsend (11-1, 1.92, five saves) and Jeff Niemann (17-0, 1.67), Townsend's roommate and fellow sophomore righthander. Combined, they have 312 strikeouts in 242 innings pitched while walking 77 and giving up just 162 hits. Niemann will get the ball for Game One, Townsend for Game Two.

"We watched them play Texas--they're a solid club," said Stanford senior catcher Ryan Garko, the team's hitting leader at .407-18-91. "We've got a lot of juniors and seniors on this team, though. We're not going to be intimidated by anybody. Their pitchers are big guys and have great numbers, but we've seen that kind of thing before.

"I mean, the juniors and seniors on this team faced Mark Prior and Kirk Saarloos two years ago, and those guys are in the big leagues. We were the only team to beat Prior that year, and we beat Saarloos out here (in the CWS). And in the super-regional, we played Long Beach State, and that's as good a two pitchers right there as anybody. Alvarez was just filthy, and Jered Weaver dealt."

Indeed, the matchup seems to be a classic one of offense versus pitching. The Cardinal beat Cal State Fullerton with the long ball in the bracket final on Thursday night, mashing three home runs to bring their season total to 72. Rice has allowed just 33 on the year; Townsend has allowed only one in 112 2/3 innings, while Niemann has yielded five.

"It's going to be fun," added Stanford outfielder Carlos Quentin, batting .400-12-62. "It will be a challenge. They're big guys and everything, and that's good stuff, but they still have to throw it over the plate and we have to try to see it and hit it. I'm excited to see what they've got."

Rice and the media are anxious to see who Stanford will have on the mound. Coach Mark Marquess declined to name a Game One starter, but he's likely to use senior righthander Ryan McCally (7-2, 4.60), who has been effective in a pair of postseason starts against Illinois-Chicago and South Carolina, with the latter start coming in the CWS. McCally is far from dominating, though, having allowed 108 hits in 90 innings.

Beyond McCally, Marquess commented that all-freshman team selection Mark Romanczuk (12-1, 3.72), a lefthander who lost his first CWS appearance against Cal State Fullerton, could be ready to pitch Saturday's opener as well, even though he pitched Thursday night in relief against the Titans. Romanczuk could start Sunday's second game, or pitch in relief throughout the best-of-three set.

If Stanford loses Saturday, it's hard to imagine that junior righthander John Hudgins (13-3, 2.96) would not get the start. Hudgins has two wins in Omaha, the last coming Wednesday in a 130-plus pitches effort against the Titans. Marquess has never been a slave to pitch counts--far from it. He does like to avoid using pitchers on short rest, a credo that has guided his management of pitchers far more than pitch counts.

With a national championship on the line, however, he sounded like a coach more than willing to use Hudgins on three days' rest Sunday if necessary.

"At this time of year, the weather is warm, and these pitchers are young men," Marquess said. "I'm more apt to use someone on short rest at this time of year than I would be otherwise."

While its hitters have outstripped Stanford's pitching reputation in 2003, Rice's bats have not overcome the attention given to their power arms. The Owls have hit just .254 in the postseason, with sophomore first baseman Vincent Sinisi, acknowledged to be the team's best hitter, struggling at 1-for-11 in the CWS. The one hit was a solo homer against Southwest Missouri State.

Kolkhorst, the self-proclaimed "Grit Man" who is tied for the team batting lead with fellow outfielder Austin Davis at .352, knows he must ignite the offense to keep the Owls from relying too much on their pitching. He has a Fullerton-esque 25 HBPs on the season, which added to hit 39 walks helps give him a team-high .477 on-base percentage.

"We know we win with pitching, defense and timely hitting," the former Blinn (Texas) JC product said. "Like in the first Texas game, they jumped out 2-0 and we'd had some hitters meetings, like before the super-regional (against Houston), where we got together and said it was time for the hitters to pick the team up. We were able to do that. I think in that Texas game (a 13-2 win) we showed we have the capability to blow a team out.

"We've got to execute our offense and get our pitchers some runs to work with."

Finally, both teams are excellent defensive teams. One interested coach sent Baseball America a statistical breakdown of Defensive Efficiency Ratings for Division I, which measure the percentage of time that the defense records an out when a ball is put in play. Theoretically, it rewards teams that have good range and isn't as affected by scorekeeping and bad fields that often have a significant impact on fielding percentages.

Naturally, Rice and Stanford finished 1-2 in the ratings, with the Owls at .742 and Stanford at .711. (for the record, the rest of the top 10 was Long Beach State, Baylor, Texas, Florida State, Cal State Fullerton, Houston, South Carolina and Ohio State.)

So in many ways, it's a classic matchup of two great teams that should produce a terrific CWS championship series.

"If you're a baseball lifer, you know that it's a great privilege to be in this position, especially in the first best-of-three series," Owls coach Wayne Graham said. "I think it's wonderful that schools like Stanford and Rice are playing for a national championship because student-athletes pay the price academically and athletically at these schools.

"In my mind, nothing could be better for college baseball than to have Rice and Stanford playing in the first best-of-three championship series."