IRVINE – He has too much class and dignity to say it, but wouldn’t you like to hear first-year UC Irvine baseball coach Mike Gillespie tell USC athletic director Mike Garrett to enjoy watching this year’s NCAA Tournament from home?
Gillespie would never do that, of course, especially considering his son-in-law, Chad Kreuter — who is married to his daughter, Kelly — is the man who was hired to succeed him after 20 years of unqualified coaching success at Troy
So you won’t hear Gillespie gloat about USC, his alma mater, failing to make the 64-team NCAA field in 2008, now that his Anteaters are headed to the NCAA regional in Lincoln, Neb.
Publicly, you won’t even hear him say he was forced to step down at USC after the 2006 season. He supposedly resigned or retired, at age 65, after 10 Pac-10 championships, 15 NCAA appearances, four College World Series berths and one national championship.
With his glittering resume, Gillespie certainly should have been allowed to leave on his own terms. Garrett, however, didn’t allow that to happen.
Gillespie obviously didn’t retire. In his first year out of uniform, he accepted a job as a scout and manager of the New York Yankees’ Class-A farm team in Staten Island.
And when the UCI job suddenly opened last fall, after George Horton departed for Oregon and Dave Serrano returned to Cal State Fullerton, Gillespie made it known he was interested in returning to the college coaching ranks in Southern California. Make that southern California.
UCI, coming off its first College World Series appearance in school history, wisely hired Gillespie.
So far, so good.
The Anteaters barged into the national rankings by rocketing to a 17-1 start, which included two admittedly painful victories over Kreuter’s Trojans, and remained in the Top 25 all season. (Eyewitnesses reported seeing Garrett squirming and seething in the stands at Dedeaux Field during an 11-3 UCI romp on March 11.)
UCI finished the regular season with a 38-16 record (14-10 in the ultra-competitive Big West, tied for third) and No. 11 ranking by Baseball America.
Even so, Gillespie needlessly worried about being left out of the NCAA Tournament until winning 2 of 3 from UC Santa Barbara in the final weekend.
“It was a grind for us,” Gillespie said Tuesday at Anteater Ballpark, the day before the Anteaters flew to Nebraska. “In my view, it was no slam dunk we were going to finish up strong and get in. … I think we played well the last two weeks and did earn our way into it,
“I would have been disappointed and felt we had failed miserably if we hadn’t gotten in.”
That’s the way Garrett should feel now.
Because he is compassionate man, Gillespie said he thought more than four Big West teams should have made the NCAA field, opining that UCSB was unfairly snubbed and that Long Beach State deserved a better draw than being joined by two other ranked teams (San Diego and Cal) in its regional. He also thought the Pac-10 deserved one or two more berths than it received.
“I’m disappointed Santa Barbara didn’t get in,” he said. “I’m a West Coast guy, and all those years at the other place, I always felt … well, you always like your own conference.”
Notice he said “the other place” — not USC.
And when he talked about the Long Beach regional, the only one among the 16 featuring three ranked teams, he sounded as if he had been personally wronged.
“The Long Beach regional bothers me; it’s just insane,” he said, adding that San Diego should have been a No. 1 seed elsewhere instead of being sent to Long Beach as a No. 2.
Then came the zinger.
“I’m unconvinced that everyone on the (NCAA selection) committee is doing his homework,” he said. “Maybe in their conference, maybe in their own little region, (they are knowledgeable).
“But I think if you’re on that committee, as important as it is — hey, look, people get fired, I can tell you that … the people that have the responsibility, they need to step up and meet that responsibility. I’m not convinced they do.”
Wait a minute. Was that a Freudian slip? Did Mike Gillespie just say he was fired?
That’s OK. He’s entitled. He’s also entitled to gloat.
Enjoy the NCAA Tournament, Mike Garrett. In case you’ve forgotten, it’s the 10th anniversary of Mike Gillespie’s 1998 national championship team at USC.
– Randy Youngman, The Orange County Register
Great article on a great coach and an even better person. Mike is a class act and will continue to be a successful coach.