Sudden upward swing for Hawkeye baseball

University of Iowa baseball had been a non-story for quite awhile.

The Hawkeyes finished last in the Big Ten in 2008 and 2009. Less than three weeks ago, they lost the opener of a three-game series at Penn State to slip to 6-10 in conference play. Ho hum, they were sinking in the standings yet again.

Except that they didn't. For whatever reason, a light bulb went on in State College.

“After that first game at Penn State,” said Iowa first baseman Phil Keppler of Manchester, “our hitting coach (Ryan Brownlee)

 had all the hitters come to his hotel room. He told us that one of the first goals to come together as a team and start winning games was to win every pitch.”

That's impossible, of course, even if you're Albert Pujols or Roy Halladay. But the message was focus, focus, focus on one pitch at a time. And the message took. In a phone interview from the team bus this week as the Hawkeyes rolled to Ohio, Keppler used the phrase “win every pitch” at least four times.

It must be working. The Hawkeyes won their last two games at Penn State, took two of three from Ohio State, and swept last weekend's three-game set with Purdue in Iowa City. It was Iowa's first Big Ten series sweep in three years.

That left Iowa 13-11 and tied for third in the final Big Ten standings, and put them in the conference tournament in Columbus, Ohio, that starts today with the Hawkeyes' 11 a.m. game against Purdue. The winner of the six-team, four-day tourney gets an automatic berth in an NCAA tournament regional.

Today's game, and all others in the tourney, will be aired live on the Big Ten Network.

Two of the Hawkeye mainstays are red-shirt sophomore Keppler and junior Zach McCool. The two were teammates at West Delaware High School, and have played baseball together since they were 8 years old.

They are two of Iowa's top five players in batting average. McCool hit .378 in Big Ten games, Keppler .321. They endured a lot of losing as Hawkeyes before this season.

“The last two years had been pretty frustrating,” Keppler said. “But this is awesome. I come from a high school where we won a lot of games. There's nothing like winning.”

Today the West Delaware duo and their teammates participate in Iowa's first league tourney since 2007.

“We believed in ourselves and the team,” McCool said. “Everybody from top to bottom in the lineup believes in himself as a hitter, and our pitchers are starting to throw real well.”

It's hard to imagine that belief was there when Iowa dropped nine straight nonconference games in March. Or when they suffered an April 4 doubleheader sweep at Michigan State by the total score of 42-13.

But, Keppler said, “We always believed this was possible. Everyone saw we had a good team and we were going to be a good team. It all hadn't really come together until the last couple weeks.”

“I'd never say it was a struggle,” added McCool. “It was a work-in-progress, I'd say. We all knew we had the tools to be a good team.”

Whatever happens in Columbus this week, last weekend should have given the Hawkeyes something good to remember for a while.

Iowa needed that sweep over Purdue to qualify for the Big Ten tourney. It was time to win every pitch. The Hawkeyes' doubleheader sweep on Friday set up an all-everything game for them on Saturday.

After falling behind 5-2, Iowa pounded out a 12-9 win. Two days later, the Hawkeyes were on a bus for a 540-mile ride to a postseason tournament.

“We're not going there just to be in the tournament,” McCool said. “We're going to show what Iowa baseball is. I think we have the confidence to win the whole thing.”