The Terrapins baseball team is off to its best start in 25 years. Just try telling coach Erik Bakich that it matters.
“We expect to break a lot of records in this program, so I don’t really care how good the start is,” Bakich said Sunday night of his 5-1 Terps. “We are taking the approach that we haven’t done anything yet. We are still unproven and it’s a long season. It’s a long season, and it’s good to start out on a high note, but this is a level that we expect to play at.”
The nation has noticed. The Terps debuted in three national rankings this week, placing No. 16 in the ESPN Power Rankings, No. 20 in the Perfect Game USA Top 50 and No. 27 in the Collegiate Baseball News Top 30. The Terps also own four victories over teams in the Perfect Game USA Top 50 (Purdue, East Carolina and two against UCLA).
The last time the Terps won five of their first since games was 1987, but the rest of that particular season isn’t worth repeating. After going 5-1, the Terps finished the year with a 15-24-1 mark — something Bakich would like to avoid.
Before the season started, he talked about how what validates the development of his program is not moral victories but on-field victories. So though five wins in six games to start the year might seem like a big deal to a success-starved program, Bakich knows there’s more ahead.
“I know everybody’s excited because it hasn’t been done before,” Bakich said. “But to be honest, this is exactly where we expect to be.”
WHITE’S EMERGENCE
Even after early-season struggles, center fielder Charlie White remained in the leadoff spot for the Terps. The team’s leading hitter in 2011, White’s reliable production was nowhere to be found after he posted an 0-for-15 mark through Saturday morning’s game against Western Carolina.
All that changed against Purdue and East Carolina last weekend, when White went 5-for-8 and scored two runs and had an RBI.
“Charlie White’s a good hitter,” Bakich said. “It was just a matter of time. Baseball is a game of peaks and valleys, and it just so happens that he started the season in a little bit of a valley but then got right back on top again. We have all the confidence in the world in Charlie and that’s why we continue to hit him in the leadoff spot, because we knew it was only a matter of time before he would break out.”
White hit .304 in 2011 with 30 runs scored and 11 doubles. He scored two runs in the series at then-No. 14 UCLA after getting on base through walks and errors, but his production at the plate is especially valuable to a team that will have to generate runs against ACC pitching as the season wears on.
DEFENSE HOLDING UP
Pitcher Brett Harman admitted he didn’t have his best game Sunday against East Carolina. The senior, making his second start since returning from Tommy John surgery, pitched five innings and allowed one unearned run on five hits. He struck out four, but allowed the leadoff batter to reach in four of his five innings.
As happened in his first start against UCLA, however, the defense came to Harman’s aid, keeping the Terps in the game, paving the way for their ninth-inning heroics and, in Harman’s view, pointing to something greater about the Terps.
“That’s the sign of a good team, and that’s what this team has been doing great,” Harman said. “When one guy is down, everyone picks each other up, and that’s been a large part of our success this year. I think the defense played unbelievable in terms of amazing plays and it kept us in the game.”
Though the Terps committed four errors over their past two games against Purdue and East Carolina, Bakich still sees the strengths of this Terps team as its pitching and defense.
“A couple of those errors were just flukes,” Bakich said. “They were just little things that could get cleaned up just with some practice time this week. I’m actually very pleased with the defensive performance we’ve gotten.”
dgallen@umdbk.com
