20) JUNE 2005 – ASU BASEBALL RUN TO COLLEGE WORLD SERIES 3RD-PLACE FINISH
Virtually all of the highlights I’ve shared with you so far – and will continue to share with you here – have been from individual games. This next reflection spans 11 ASU Baseball games in May & June of 2005, a sensational post-season run that, to this day, rates as one of my top five Sun Devil sports memories of all-time.
Though they struggled through a somewhat disappointing regular season, coach Pat Murphy’s 2005 Sun Devils nonetheless earned a nod as one of 16 regional hosts in the upcoming NCAA Tournament. Playing as a #2 seed in their own Tempe Regional, the Devils swept three games, twice beating regional top seed Coastal Carolina, to advance to a best two-of-three Super Regional against ASU’s long-time post-season nemesis Cal State Fullerton.
Game one of the Super Regional had the most bizarre ending I’ve ever seen in a baseball game. Trailing ASU 2-1 entering the last of the ninth, CSUF rallied for two runs to win the game, with the deciding run scoring when Sun Devil relief pitcher Zechry Zinicola was called for a balk while issuing an intentional walk, allowing a runner at third to come home with the game-winner. I have never – EVER – seen an umpire call a balk during the issuing of an intentional walk. Actor (and devoted Cal State Fullerton alum and baseball fan) Kevin Costner attended that game, and as he left Goodwin Field that evening, he looked over toward me and my broadcast partner, the late, great Bob Eger, and as we were doing our post-game wrap-up, Costner smiled while shrugging his shoulders as if to say “I don’t believe it either!”
Fortunately, the Sun Devils bounced back to win the final two games of the Super Regional, including a 9-8 come-from-behind victory in the game three clincher that rates as one of the best games I’ve ever seen.
From there, it was on to Omaha, NE., and ASU’s first trip to the College World Series in seven years. A loss to Nebraska, followed by a Father’s Day elimination-game win over Tennessee (in which my future broadcast partner Seth Dhaenens drove in the winning run with a 7th-inning double, just as his Dad arrived at Rosenblatt Stadium on Father’s Day!), set the stage for a College World Series game for the ages on June 21, 2005.
Playing home-town and home-state favorite Nebraska in another elimination game, ASU went back-and-forth with the Huskers, who took a 7-5 lead in the…
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