Mentioning the year 1994 to any baseball fan will undoubtedly bring unpleasant repressed memories back to the surface. 2007 Hall of Fame inductee Tony Gwynn was chasing .400, the oft-moribund Montreal Expos were baseball’s best team at 74-40, and juiced-up San Francisco Giants slugger Matt Williams was closing in on Roger Maris’ single-season home-run record, with 43 home runs through 112 games.
And then it all ended. On Aug. 12, the players’ union officially began a 232 day strike that wiped out what could have been a groundbreaking season.
Mention the year 1994 to anyone involved with Wesleyan athletics, however, and one will likely encounter a different reaction. Spring 1994 gave Wesleyan one of the most successful teams in its history: its 30-8 baseball team, which ended the season as the national Division III runner-up.
From its establishment in 1971, the NESCAC did not allow its teams to participate in NCAA postseason competition, with the exception of championship-meet sports such as swimming and cross country. In 1993, however, the restriction was lifted for all sports (except football). Expectations were high for the 1994 baseball team, which was coming off an 18-8 season—its seventh straight winning year—and boasted an impressive roster led by shortstop (and current Cardinal head coach) Mark Woodworth ’94. But almost no one could have predicted how well the Cardinals would take advantage of their newfound national stage.
The Cardinals began the season by tearing through the Warner Southern Tournament in Florida, winning nine of 12 games. Among Wesleyan’s victims were three Division I institutions: Boston University, Army, and Columbia University.
The Cardinals then returned to New England and picked up right where they left off, with a doubleheader sweep at Brandeis University sandwiched around home wins over Middlebury, Springfield, and Albertus Magnus. Little Three rival Williams College handed Wesleyan a 13-5 defeat on Andrus Field, snapping the Cardinals’ nine-game winning streak. Wesleyan then proceeded to win its next four contests—including a doubleheader sweep of Trinity—to move to 18-4 and tie the previous season’s win total.
Following a home loss to Division I Quinnipiac, the Cardinals swept doubleheaders against Williams and Amherst—outscoring their rivals 27-5—to secure the fourth of six straight Little Three titles. Wesleyan fell to Amherst the following week but swept a doubleheader against Bowdoin to finish the regular season 24-6, matching the record of the 1983 team and tying the school record for wins in a season.
However, this time the Cardinals’ season wasn’t over. Wesleyan qualified for the NCAA Division III Tournament and swept three home games against UMass Dartmouth and Southern Maine (twice)—by scores of 9-3, 9-4, and 10-4, respectively—to win the New England Regional and advance to the College World Series for the first time.
In Battle Creek, Mich., Wesleyan trounced The College of Wooster 3-1 and Carthage College 6-3 to set up a showdown with UWisconsin-Oshkosh. The Titans, who were making the 16th of what would be 21 straight appearances in the tournament, handed Wesleyan a 12-3 defeat—the first time Wesleyan had given up ten runs since the last game of the 1993 season. The Cardinals rebounded to defeat UCalifornia-San Diego 5-1, but lost the rematch with UWisconsin-Oshkosh, 6-2, to give the Titans their second title. UWisconsin-Oshkosh, which was the national runner-up in 1993, outscored its opponents 74-15 in the tournament; Wesleyan was the only school to hold them to under nine runs.
Because of the tournament’s double elimination format, Wesleyan would have had to beat Wisconsin-Oshkosh twice to win the championship. While this is not unprecedented, it is extremely rare—five teams have entered the championship game undefeated and lost twice since the Division III championship began in 1977, most recently in 2003. Thus, the 1994 baseball team joins the 2006 and 2007 men’s lacrosse squads as the only teams in Wesleyan athletics history to come within two wins of a national title. The team is also one of only two in Wesleyan history to reach the 30-win mark (the 2001 volleyball team went 30-6).
Several individual records were set during that season as well. Craig Brewer ’95 tossed 99 innings and racked up a 12-0 record en route to becoming Wesleyan’s all-time most successful pitcher, with a 29-4 record. Also, Woodworth was one of three Cardinals (along with Derek Butts ’94 and Josh Pepe ’95) to play in all 38 games that season. Woodworth also broke the 100-hit mark, finishing his career with 117; he is currently tied for 20th on the all-time list with Rob Coughlin ’07. In all, six players from the 1994 team reached 100 career hits.
Wesleyan baseball has fallen on hard times as of late, losing at least 19 games each of the past four seasons and amassing a record of 0-11-1 in Little Three games the last two years. The team’s struggles in recent years provide a stark contrast to the force that was 1990s Wesleyan baseball. From 1990 through 1999, the Cardinals amassed a .618 cumulative winning percentage and had six seasons of 18 or more wins. Still, the presence of Woodworth in the dugout provides an omnipresent link to the highest of highs for this tradition-rich program.
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