Overall Record: 37-21
CAA Record: 17-13 (Fourth place/ 11 teams)
All-CAA: First Team: Rob Lind, Mark Micowski, Brandon Williams
Second Team: Will Cambell, Drew Shields
Thirs Team: Jake Dyer
ATLANTA- In head coach Greg Frady's fifth season at the helm, the Georgia State baseball team cemented itself as a Colonial Athletic Association stalwart and a program on the rise nationally. The Panthers proved to be consistent winners and perennial contenders, making their third straight appearance in the Colonial Athletic Association Tournament.
Georgia State ended the season the same way it started it, with a conference-high six players earning all-CAA honors as the team posted its highest regular season winning percentage in school history and a 37-21 overall record. The Panthers' 17 conference wins tied for the most all-time as the team captured the fourth seed in the CAA Tournament.
Season highlights also included a school-record 11 straight victories in March, five wins over RPI Top-60 teams and a third win in five seasons at ranked rival Georgia Tech.
The Panthers earned votes during the season in the sport's most prestigious polls, including the USA Today/ESPN Coaches' Poll three times and the National Collegiate Baseball Writers' Association Poll seven times. The team was also named among the Collegiate Baseball Preseason Fabulous 40.
Armed for Success
A season after GSU led the nation in runs scored, it was the Panthers' much improved pitching staff that guided GSU to its record success in 2011. In their first season under the direction of new pitching coach Jason Arnold, Panther arms recorded the lowest team earned run average in school history at 4.29, over two runs lower than a season before.
The Panthers also set school records by tossing seven shutouts and allowing just 284 runs, 245 earned runs, 31 wild pitches and 25 home runs. Additionally, the GSU staff kept the ball down in the strike zone, inducing the most groundouts in school history, 561.
Senior Will Campbell led the way on the mound, tying a school record with nine wins in earning All-CAA second team honors. Campbell led all Panther starters with a 2.86 ERA, second-lowest in single-season history. He tossed a team-high 94.1 innings, tied for seventh-most in team history. The right-hander earned CAA Pitcher of the Week honors twice after picking up complete game victories over conference foes Hofstra and William & Mary.
Junior Justin Malone gave the Panthers a powerful 1-2 starting punch, picking up seven wins and losing just once in his first season as a starter. Transitioning from the closer role after becoming GSU's all-time saves leader in his first two seasons on campus, the right-hander now boasts a career record of 12-2, the highest winning percentage in school history. Malone allowed the fewest all-time walks per nine innings during the season at 1.59. Malone was named the CAA's Pitcher of the Week a school-record three times throughout the year, including after a complete game four-hit shutout of Northeastern in April.
On the back end, junior closer Jake Dyer made an immediate impact in his first season at GSU in being named to the All-CAA third team. The right-hander saved eight games, second-most in a single season in school history, compiling a 1.67 ERA with 23 strikeouts in 32.1 innings.
Junior Nick Squeglia also contributed a career year with 45 strikeouts in as many innings while seniors Charley Olson and Aidan Francis each reached the five-win mark once more.
Pop at the Plate
Once again under the direction of head coach Frady and hitting coach Brad Stromdahl, the Panther offense outslugged opponents throughout 2011 en route to 37 regular season wins.
Georgia State ranked in the CAA's top three of nearly every major offensive category, including second with a .301 batting average and 394 runs scored. The Panthers set a school record with 52 sacrifice bunts and tied another with 93 stolen bases in 122 attempts.
2011 CAA Preaseason Player of the Year Mark Micowski lived up to the billing as one of the conference's top stars, batting a team-high .351 with 20 doubles and 48 RBIs. He set a new school record with 239 at bats, belting 84 hits, fourth-most in GSU history. Micowski racked up a team-high 127 total bases, with four triples and five home runs. He also stole 12 bases and scored 51 runs, second most on the team. Micowski was named CAA Player of the Week and CollegeBaseballInsider.com's Northeast Region Player of the Week in March after an 11-for-20 performance at the plate over five games with 12 runs scored.
Fellow senior Rob Lind joined Micowski on the All-CAA first team after leading the Panthers with a .471 on-base percentage. The second baseman drew a school-record 53 walks, ranking among the NCAA's top five walks leaders throughout the season. At one point during the year, Lind set a school record by reaching base 16 safely straight times, falling two shy of an NCAA record. He also belted 11 doubles and 10 home runs, scored a team-high 52 times and drove in 37 runs.
Junior infielder Brandon Williams rounded out a trio of Panthers named to the CAA's first team with a .342 season at the plate, climbing into the school's all-time record books in hits, doubles and runs scored. He also shined defensively on the infield corners, making 55 starts at first and third base.
Williams and Lind were also named CAA Players of the Week in March and May, respectively.
Sophomore Drew Shields was named to the all-conference second team as a designated hitter in his first season at GSU, fitting in nicely among a talented group of GSU veterans. Shields batted .321 and scored 35 runs in 37 starts.
Just Fine in the Field
Another key to the Panthers' stellar 2011 season was the defense boasting a .969 fielding percentage, highest in school history. The Panthers racked up a record 655 assists while committing the second-fewest errors ever, 71, going errorless in 19 games during the season.
Injury Bug
It's hard to know just how high the Panthers would have soared in 2011 with a healthy roster, as five starters with 329 combined career starts were lost to season-ending injuries during the course of the year.
Senior outfielder Jonathan Kolowich's season ended before it even began due to a back injury. Kolowich had played 109 games in the outfield over three seasons with a .309 batting average. Junior slugger Joey Wood, a career .355 hitter, suffered multiple injuries in ending another stellar season short on March 25. Sophomore designated hitter Drew Shields and senior outfielder Brett Maxwell, who played key roles in GSU's record-setting regular season, both were unavailable for postseason play with late-season setbacks. Shields had made 37 starts, batting .321, before suffering a shoulder injury after his final game on May 14. Maxwell was an outfield linchpin all season long for the Panthers, starting 46 times with a .310 average, before tearing his ACL in the final week of the regular season while tracking down a fly ball at Mercer. Lastly, senior catcher Carter Sackett was limited to a designated hitter role for the CAA Tournament after suffering a late-season shoulder injury. He had started at catcher 22 times during the season, throwing out 10 base runners.
While the Panthers adjusted as best as they could with the talent at hand, GSU certainly missed having four .300-plus hitters in the lineup for the team's postseason run, in addition to its top defensive catcher.
The Road Back to Wilmington
Georgia State began the 2011 regular season with an impressive three-game sweep of Texas Southern, tossing two straight shutouts to open the year. In total, GSU pitchers started the season with 20.2 straight scoreless innings and yielded just one run to the Tigers over three contests in beginning the year 3-0.
After walloping in-state rival Mercer and taking three of four from Western Illinois, the Panthers trekked across town to Russ Chandler Stadium at 7-1 to face #23 Georgia Tech March 2. Senior Mark Micowski led the game off in a big way, blasting a home run to right field and setting the tone for the evening. The Panthers also got big performances from Brandon Williams and Joey Wood in piling up 12 hits. Senior left-hander Aidan Francis and junior closer Jake Dyer held the Yellow Jackets in check on the mound, sending GSU to its third win in five years at Tech, 6-3. Francis would earn CAA Pitcher of the Week honors by striking out six Yellow Jackets over 7.0 stellar innings.
The Panthers continued the week against top-level competition with a trip to Starkville, Miss., playing two games each against Iowa and Mississippi State. GSU opened with its second-ever win against a Big Ten foe on Friday with a 10-6 win over Iowa in which it pounded out 16 singles. GSU then lost a rain-soaked affair to MSU Saturday night and then a walk-off affair in the rematch against Iowa Sunday, before falling in the tournament's final contest against the host Bulldogs, 7-3. GSU still left Starkville with confidence at 9-4 overall, having won two games in the week over power conference teams.
Frady's group responded to the three-game losing streak in impressive fashion, reeling off a stellar 11-game winning streak that included wins over its first Colonial Athletic Association opponents of the season. After defeating UNC Asheville at home March 8, the Panthers swept a three-game set with conference foe Towson at Panthersville, a series that paid dividends all season long. Senior Ryan Fleming delivered back-to-back game winning RBIs in one-run wins Friday and Saturday.
After midweek wins against Alabama State and Harvard pushed the team's win streak to six and overall record to 15-4, GSU hosted Murray State March 18-20 for another non-conference weekend series. The Panthers flew past the Breds, scoring 42 runs over three games to sweep the series and improve to 18-4 overall, having won a school record nine straight.
Georgia State then took out metro Atlanta rival Kennesaw State in a midweek matchup, and welcomed CAA opponent VCU into town March 25-27, looking to stay red hot. Weather forced the teams into a Friday doubleheader, and the Panthers won their 11th straight game in the series opener, 11-8. The win gave the Panthers their 20th of the season, as they became the fastest team in school history to reach the mark, in just 24 total games. The rest of the series slipped away from GSU, as the school-record 11 game winning streak ended in the second half of Friday's doubleheader in an extra-inning defeat to the Rams, followed by a Sunday loss that gave VCU the series.
The Panthers responded with a 16-0 midweek thrashing of Florida A&M March 29 to improve to 21-6 and hit the road for their first conference series away from home, beginning the month of April at Delaware. The Panthers scored three times in the CAA series' first inning, but yielded 15 of the next 21 runs in dropping the first two games to the Blue Hens. GSU salvaged the final game of the series by taking a dramatic 10-8 decision to improve to 22-8 overall, 5-4 in conference.
Georgia State briefly returned home and continued its in-state success with a 9-4 win over Mercer April 5. Up next for GSU was one of the most anticipated series of the season, a trip to Harrisonburg, Va., for a matchup at James Madison between the conference's top two preseason coaches' picks.
After being delayed one day by rain, the CAA's two most prolific offenses put on a show on Saturday and Sunday in a series that GSU won't soon forget. In game one, the Panthers jumped out to a 6-1 lead, but surrendered eight-straight runs to the nation's highest scoring team in dropping the opener, 10-6. The Panthers rebounded in a big way in game two, belting four home runs and 16 hits en route to a 16-3 win. Senior Charley Olson tossed his second career complete game in the victory.
With the Panthers and Dukes tied at a game apiece, it was Sunday's finale that made the series one of the most special in recent history. Trailing 6-5 in the ninth inning, senior Rob Lind stepped to the plate with the bases loaded and launched a grand slam over the wall in left field, sending GSU to a 9-6 victory and first-ever series win over James Madison. The win put the Panthers back on the national radar at 25-9 overall, 7-5 in league play.
The Panthers then split their next four games, dropping a heartbreaking series to Old Dominion April 17 as pinch runner Wes Grant was thrown out at the plate for the final out of Sunday's series finale against the Monarchs.
After dropping an April 19 decision to Kennesaw State, its first loss in five tries against an in-state foe, GSU hit the road once more in conference, traveling to Boston for a three-game set at Northeastern April 22-24. After splitting the first two games, junior Justin Malone delivered a dazzling Sunday performance for GSU, tossing the first complete game shutout of the Greg Frady era in a 5-0 Panther win to claim the series and improve to 29-13, 10-8.
The Panthers returned to Atlanta to shut down Oglethorpe in a midweek matchup, claiming their 30th win of the season, 5-0. It marked the fourth consecutive season in which Frady's squad had reached the 30-win plateau.
Georgia State then continued its winning ways by sweeping Hofstra, April 29-May 1, to improve to 13-8 in CAA play. Senior Will Campbell's complete game four-hit shutout on just 85 total pitches in Saturday's 13-0 win stood as one of the best performances in school history, for which Campbell was named the CAA's Pitcher of the Week.
With the conference race heating up in the season's final month, the Panthers hit the road for UNC Wilmington May 7 in what they hoped was the first of two trips to the site of the season-ending conference tournament. The first go-round didn't quite go as planned, as GSU suffered a three-game sweep at the hands of the Seahawks May 7-8, the first in over a year. GSU's Sunday charge fell short in a 6-4 defeat to close out the series as the Panthers found themselves at 33-16 overall, 13-11 in the CAA.
In need of conference wins and with just two CAA series remaining, the Panthers remained on the road May 12-14 for a three-game set at William & Mary, who entered the series deadlocked with the Panthers in fifth place in the CAA standings. Another complete game effort from Campbell gave GSU a game one victory, but a heartbreaking 8-7 loss in Friday's game two tied the series. With the series winner maintaining control of its own destiny in the postseason race, the Panthers came up huge in the rubber match, taking an 11-6 Saturday decision over the Tribe to claim the series and move to 15-12 in league play.
A return trip to Macon for the season's final non-conference tilt at Mercer on May 17 proved to be a costly one for the Panthers. Before the game, GSU learned that sophomore standout Drew Shields would be sidelined for the rest of the year with a shoulder ailment, then senior outfielder Brett Maxwell suffered a season-ending ACL tear chasing down a ball in center during play in a 9-6 loss.
Down to one healthy substitute, the Panthers entered the final weekend of the season against George Mason at 35-18, 15-12 in league play. GSU still held the cards in its efforts to reach the four-team CAA Tournament, needing to win at least two games over the Patriots to clinch a postseason berth. After splitting the series' first two contests, GSU entered the 56th and final game of the regular season needing a win to keep its record-setting year alive. It turned out, the Panthers were just saving the best for last, saying goodbye to 15 seniors in dramatic fashion.
Locked in a pitching duel, right-hander Malone allowed just one run over eight innings, striking out a career-high 11 Patriot batters. Tied 1-1 through nine innings, the teams would need extras to decide the season's final game. Brandon Williams became the hero by delivering a 10th inning walk-off single to score Shane Hammond, giving GSU a 2-1 win that sent the Panthersville baseball complex into a frenzy. The win secured the series and the fourth seed for the Panthers in their third-straight CAA Tournament, one of just two conference schools to reach the tournament each of the last three seasons.
Arriving in Wilmington May 24 for the second time in three weeks, the Panthers were greeted with a flurry of CAA honors during the season-ending championship banquet. Micowski, Lind and Williams were named to the All-CAA first team while Shields and Campbell took home second team honors and Dyer was given third team recognition. GSU tied ODU for the most first team players and JMU for the most overall selections.
Once tournament play began however, it was clear to see the impact that GSU's many injuries had on their production. The Panthers' pitching staff did its best to keep their teammates close, but for the second straight season, GSU would end its CAA run after just two games.
In the tournament opener, Georgia State squared off against the nation's highest scoring team and top seed, James Madison. Senior Will Campbell allowed just one run on the mound to the Dukes through five innings, but then yielded two more in the sixth as a struggling Panther offense fell behind 3-0. JMU would add one more score in the seventh inning, the game's final tally. GSU mustered just five hits in the game, led by Carter Sackett's double and single, losing the game 4-0.
The Panthers moved on to face Old Dominion in an elimination game on the tournament's second day, as GSU looked to exact revenge on the second-seeded Monarchs. Once more, GSU fell behind by multiple runs after ODU scored three times in the first inning and twice in the second to claim an early 5-0 lead. The Panther bats awoke in the bottom of the second, scoring three runs on three hits to put up a fight. Senior Bryan Condotta's two-run double into the left field corner put GSU on the board first, then the shortstop came around to score on an error to make the score 5-3. Unfortunately for the Panthers, it was the last inning in which they would score, threatening offensively but eventually falling to the Monarchs, 7-3. GSU was eliminated from the CAA Tournament, ending its 2011 season.
With a departing senior class boasting 143 career wins, the most in school history, GSU will have big shoes to fill as it looks toward the 2011-2012 season. There is plenty to look forward to, however. Thanks to an experienced coaching staff, a host of proven winners returning to the roster and a very talented incoming recruiting class, GSU figures to keep its winning tradition alive next season and for years to come.
