MORGANTOWN - Jedd Gyorko had just finished what - to almost anyone who has never seriously played the game - might have seemed an excruciating, almost interminable afternoon of work.
MORGANTOWN - Jedd Gyorko had just finished what - to almost anyone who has never seriously played the game - might have seemed an excruciating, almost interminable afternoon of work.
There had been stretching and running and throwing and hitting, followed by more running and then, just for good measure, even more running. All of it was on an unseasonably warm spring afternoon when the sun beat down and the temperature reached into the 80s.
One couldn't help but recall John Kruk's old line about how he was "a baseball player, not an athlete,'' and think that just maybe he didn't know what he was talking about, because at least on this afternoon it took more than athleticism.
The athletic part of that whole exercise, though, was not what stuck. Let's face it, baseball players are just a different breed. They'll go through just about any form of hell to play their game and so doing it on a sunny spring day isn't exactly torture.
For Gyorko and his West Virginia teammates to do it with enthusiasm and determination even in the face of what it had gotten them to that point? Well, that seemed rather at odds with human nature.
On that early May afternoon, the Mountaineers were coming off an embarrassing three-game sweep at the hands of Cincinnati, losses that were No. 13, 14 and 15 of their Big East season. That would be merely disappointing were it not for the fact that there had been just 18 league games to that point.
Yes, West Virginia was 3-15 in the Big East. At 18-26 and with roughly a dozen games remaining the Mountaineers seemed well on their way to sprinting past nothing but the school's all-time record for losses in a season.
It was the enthusiasm despite that futility, not the heat or the post-practice sprints, that is now memorable.
"Anytime that you're not winning it's tough. If we liked to lose we wouldn't come out here and practice and play competitive baseball,'' Gyorko said at the time. "Things haven't gone our way, but we're working. We're still going to come out here and work no matter what happens and try to make ourselves better.''
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Remember this WVU team for its enthusiasm
MORGANTOWN - Jedd Gyorko had just finished what - to almost anyone who has never seriously played the game - might have seemed an excruciating, almost interminable afternoon of work.
There had been stretching and running and throwing and hitting, followed by more running and then, just for good measure, even more running. All of it was on an unseasonably warm spring afternoon when the sun beat down and the temperature reached into the 80s.
One couldn't help but recall John Kruk's old line about how he was "a baseball player, not an athlete,'' and think that just maybe he didn't know what he was talking about, because at least on this afternoon it took more than athleticism.
The athletic part of that whole exercise, though, was not what stuck. Let's face it, baseball players are just a different breed. They'll go through just about any form of hell to play their game and so doing it on a sunny spring day isn't exactly torture.
For Gyorko and his West Virginia teammates to do it with enthusiasm and determination even in the face of what it had gotten them to that point? Well, that seemed rather at odds with human nature.
On that early May afternoon, the Mountaineers were coming off an embarrassing three-game sweep at the hands of Cincinnati, losses that were No. 13, 14 and 15 of their Big East season. That would be merely disappointing were it not for the fact that there had been just 18 league games to that point.
Yes, West Virginia was 3-15 in the Big East. At 18-26 and with roughly a dozen games remaining the Mountaineers seemed well on their way to sprinting past nothing but the school's all-time record for losses in a season.
It was the enthusiasm despite that futility, not the heat or the post-practice sprints, that is now memorable.
"Anytime that you're not winning it's tough. If we liked to lose we wouldn't come out here and practice and play competitive baseball,'' Gyorko said at the time. "Things haven't gone our way, but we're working. We're still going to come out here and work no matter what happens and try to make ourselves better.''
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MORGANTOWN - Jedd Gyorko had just finished what - to almost anyone who has never seriously played the game - might have seemed an excruciating, almost interminable afternoon of work.
There had been stretching and running and throwing and hitting, followed by more running and then, just for good measure, even more running. All of it was on an unseasonably warm spring afternoon when the sun beat down and the temperature reached into the 80s.
One couldn't help but recall John Kruk's old line about how he was "a baseball player, not an athlete,'' and think that just maybe he didn't know what he was talking about, because at least on this afternoon it took more than athleticism.
The athletic part of that whole exercise, though, was not what stuck. Let's face it, baseball players are just a different breed. They'll go through just about any form of hell to play their game and so doing it on a sunny spring day isn't exactly torture.
For Gyorko and his West Virginia teammates to do it with enthusiasm and determination even in the face of what it had gotten them to that point? Well, that seemed rather at odds with human nature.
On that early May afternoon, the Mountaineers were coming off an embarrassing three-game sweep at the hands of Cincinnati, losses that were No. 13, 14 and 15 of their Big East season. That would be merely disappointing were it not for the fact that there had been just 18 league games to that point.
Yes, West Virginia was 3-15 in the Big East. At 18-26 and with roughly a dozen games remaining the Mountaineers seemed well on their way to sprinting past nothing but the school's all-time record for losses in a season.
It was the enthusiasm despite that futility, not the heat or the post-practice sprints, that is now memorable.
"Anytime that you're not winning it's tough. If we liked to lose we wouldn't come out here and practice and play competitive baseball,'' Gyorko said at the time. "Things haven't gone our way, but we're working. We're still going to come out here and work no matter what happens and try to make ourselves better.''
That West Virginia's baseball team managed to do just that is fairly remarkable.
Since that sweep at the hands of Cincinnati, the Mountaineers are 11-2. On Saturday afternoon, when catcher Kevin Griffin hit a ninth-inning, three-run, walk-off home run to beat Villanova 3-2, West Virginia somehow had managed to put itself in position to finish in the Big East's top eight and make the league tournament. A few hours later, when regular-season champion Louisville completed a three-game sweep of Notre Dame to eliminate the Irish, it was a done deal.
"It was unbelievable,'' Gyor-ko said. "It's the most amazing feeling I've ever had playing a baseball game.''
OK, so in the grand scheme of things this is probably just a temporary reprieve from the ultimate end to the season. Barring a lengthy stay in the double-elimination tournament that begins Wednesday in Clearwater, Fla., West Virginia (27-28) is still likely to finish with its first losing record in five years. That the Mountaineers play top-seeded Louisville in the first game doesn't make things any easier.
Then again, this team won't reach that school record of 32 losses. It won't be remembered for its early failures, but rather for its amazing fortitude. It won't - regardless of what happens this week in Clearwater - go out with a whimper, but instead a bang. The last three weeks have assured that.
And that's about all coach Greg Van Zant can ask of a team that this season had to replace five quality starting players, lost the school record-holder for batting average in a season (Dan DiBartolomeo) to an injured shoulder back in February and played a bruising schedule.
"We were 3-15 in the league and our guys just kept coming out and working and then all of a sudden we string some wins together,'' Van Zant said. "I'd rather coach a bunch of guys who are going to work to get better and improve as the season goes on and win down the stretch than a bunch of guys that are going to shut it down when you lose 10 or 12 games at the end of the season. I'm really proud of them.''
This article is available only to our premium digital content subscribers.
Remember this WVU team for its enthusiasm
MORGANTOWN - Jedd Gyorko had just finished what - to almost anyone who has never seriously played the game - might have seemed an excruciating, almost interminable afternoon of work.
There had been stretching and running and throwing and hitting, followed by more running and then, just for good measure, even more running. All of it was on an unseasonably warm spring afternoon when the sun beat down and the temperature reached into the 80s.
One couldn't help but recall John Kruk's old line about how he was "a baseball player, not an athlete,'' and think that just maybe he didn't know what he was talking about, because at least on this afternoon it took more than athleticism.
The athletic part of that whole exercise, though, was not what stuck. Let's face it, baseball players are just a different breed. They'll go through just about any form of hell to play their game and so doing it on a sunny spring day isn't exactly torture.
For Gyorko and his West Virginia teammates to do it with enthusiasm and determination even in the face of what it had gotten them to that point? Well, that seemed rather at odds with human nature.
On that early May afternoon, the Mountaineers were coming off an embarrassing three-game sweep at the hands of Cincinnati, losses that were No. 13, 14 and 15 of their Big East season. That would be merely disappointing were it not for the fact that there had been just 18 league games to that point.
Yes, West Virginia was 3-15 in the Big East. At 18-26 and with roughly a dozen games remaining the Mountaineers seemed well on their way to sprinting past nothing but the school's all-time record for losses in a season.
It was the enthusiasm despite that futility, not the heat or the post-practice sprints, that is now memorable.
"Anytime that you're not winning it's tough. If we liked to lose we wouldn't come out here and practice and play competitive baseball,'' Gyorko said at the time. "Things haven't gone our way, but we're working. We're still going to come out here and work no matter what happens and try to make ourselves better.''
