Recruiting guru Turtle Thomas is weaving his magic at FIU.

And here’s what I found out…
FIU is a work in progress… heavy emphasis on the “progress” part.

Whoever wrote the song lyric that said, “It never rains in California” is a stoned liar. This is the third weekend in a row where rain has altered the schedule of games in the L.A. Basin. So with showers aimed to pelt the Los Angeles area on Saturday, it was time to load up my ‘64 Dodge Dart with the wire-hanger for an antenna and make a road trip over to the Coca-Cola Classic out in the Valley of the Sun.

Once I got there, I found an interesting story with Florida International emerging as a national player in just the third year of the Turtle Thomas era. Today, I was able to catch the Golden Panthers close-shave win over Cal Poly, 10-8, to improve to 8-1 on the season.

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WHAT I SAW AT THE COCA-COLA CLASSIC.
FIU raced out to a big lead over Cal Poly, then decided to make it an adventure by giving up five runs in the 9th inning, but still held on to win.

Fla. Int’l- 020 400 103 – 10 10 3
Cal Poly- 000 300 005 – 8 8 2

Eric Berkowitz was a shining light for the Panthers today, not giving up a hit in 3.0 innings.

WP: Corey Polizzano (2-0)
LP: Joey Wagman (1-1)
Save: Bryam Garcia (2)

It wasn’t supposed to be THIS interesting.

FIU raced out to a big 6-zip lead after three and a half innings and put things on cruise control from there. They relied on steady starter Corey Polizzano, who threw a heavy dose of off-speed curves and sliders, to keep the Mustang bats at bay most of the day. The bespectacled Eric Berkowitz came in with 3.0 innings of stoic work behind Polizzano, not relinquishing a single hit in 3.0 innings of work, and the Golden Panthers raced into the bottom of the 9th inning with a 10-3 lead.

But then things got a little sketchy as three pitchers tried their hand and looked as shaky as Don Knotts, surrendering five runs (okay, just one of which was actually an earned run) on just two hits and having the defense behind them show some glaring dents, suffering two errors that made this circus a white-knuckler after all.

But Bryam Garcia was able to finally get the last two batters to whiff, ending the drama and sending FIU players onto the field with looks of absolute relief on their countenances.

The Panthers featured a 10-hit attack on the day and were paced by 9-hole hitter Junior Arrojo, who went 3-for-5 with four RBI and also helped out by a two-run triple from Jabari Henry.

The win improves the Golden Panthers from Miami to a solid 8-1 mark on the season, while the ‘Stangs stagger to a 4-6 mark.

Good things appear to be on the horizon for Coach Thomas and the Panther program, having gone from 20 wins in his first season as head honcho to 34 wins last year. After another well-lauded recruiting class showed up on campus, the youthful Panthers seem primed for a big move in 2010.

In Aaron Fitt’s weekend preview for Baseball America, coach Thomas mentions that his team can “hit throughout the lineup.” And I saw that today as seven of the nine starters got hits on the day, and the two that didn’t, leadoff man Pablo Bermudez and 8-hole hitter Jose Behar, combined for four walks.

After sweating out the harrowing 9th inning today, I caught up with the FIU head man for a quick chat before he was whisked off to the team bus.

Me:
I know you still have a pretty young team on your hands, right?

Coach Thomas:
A full 67% of our players on our team are freshmen and sophomores.

Me:
After that shaky 9th inning, what did you say to your “young” team after the game in your huddle over there?

Coach Thomas:
I told them “look guys, a lot of things happen during the course of a baseball season. You’re going to have games that appear to be a sure win and then the other team comes back and puts pressure on you. That just happens in baseball.”

But still, Bryam Garcia, our last pitcher there, he’s got big guts. He throws his best stuff. The guy before him (Andre Vazquez), he wasn’t scared at all. I mean, they all got in tight situations and threw their best stuff.

We walked a couple guys that got them started in the 9th, which is not good, but other than that the guys that came in after that delivered the pitches that they had.

Coach Thomas talks with his team after a gut-wrenching 10-8 win over Cal Poly tonight.

Me:
This is the first time I’ve had a chance to see you guys, but is there a drastic difference in what you guys had last year and what you guys have this year?

Coach Thomas:
We’re a lot more mature this year. We brought 22 or 23 new players into the program last year, and it’s always tough, because you’ve got 34 or 35 guys on the team that come from different programs and it just takes a while to mesh all the things together and to get them to understand how you want to play and how you need to play to win. So we were just so youthful last year. I know people say we had the biggest turnaround in our program’s history (from 20 wins to 34), which is good, but we didn’t finish strong last year and it cost us.

Me:
Yeah, I know your RPI ended up at No. 82.

Coach Thomas:
But we were up there around 45 or so at one time and then we kind of hit that late slide.

Me:
Yeah, I know you guys kind of faded down the stretch and that leads me to my next question, are you concerned with the depth of your team this year?

Coach Thomas:
You know, we feel like we’ve got a good bullpen and we feel like we’ve got four good starters. We feel like we can go five or six guys deep from the bullpen and throw them out there and they’ll do a good job. We really do. We’ve got three good catchers, five or six good outfielders, but we’re a little thin in the infield. We’ve got four guys to play three positions at 3rd, short and 2nd, but a couple of them are kind of nicked up right now. But we feel good about our chances this time.

Me:
I wanted to ask about your defense, and I want you to know that I was going to ask about it even BEFORE that 9th inning there where you guys kicked it around a little bit. But your defense was a big problem last year, do you see improvement in that this year?

Coach Thomas:
It was a problem last year, sure. We made three or four errors in games last year, but we seemed to make them at not-so-crucial times. You know, sometimes we would kick one with nobody on base and two outs and we would get out of it. That seemed to happen a lot, so to be honest, it wasn’t that bad. Yeah, we had a couple of plays tonight that made it interesting (laughs), but it’s all part of the growing process for a young team.

Me:
Before I let you go, I have to ask your thoughts on the Sun Belt Conference. You guys have had a great start so far with Middle Tennessee and Western Kentucky, of course. But also, the Arkansas schools are winning a lot and you guys are off to a great start. What do you have to say about your conference this year?

Coach Thomas:
I tell you what, we have 11 really good coaches that are working hard, recruiting their rear-ends off and they’re all very good baseball people. This conference is moving up. I tell ya’, I think our conference could end up being in the top four or five conferences in the country in the next year or two. I really do. ‘Coz we’re usually around No. 7 or No. 8 but we have a lot of really good teams now and we’re all getting better.

Me:
Well you’ve been at places like LSU and Arizona State, what do you see as the biggest difference between those programs and what you see in the Sun Belt?

Coach Thomas:
The biggest difference in our conference and teams in the SEC is we don’t have the big time weekend starters on the mound. We’ve got goo pitching. We’ve got good hitting too. But our conference doesn’t have aces in starters one, two and three like they do in the big conferences. I mean, Vanderbilt’s got two guys that can throw in the mid-90s starting for them. We just don’t have that kind of guy.

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TOMORROW.
On Sunday, weather permitting, FIU has a date with Arizona State in the late afternoon tomorrow to close out the Coca-Cola Classic. Games between UC Riverside and Utah Valley and Cal Poly vs. Oregon State have been moved from 1pm start times to 9am start times, in hopes they can avoid some expected rain.

Tanner Robles was spot-on into the 8th

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WHAT ELSE I SAW AT THE COCA-COLA CLASSIC.
The Beavers make quick work of Utah Valley to improve to 2-1 at the tournament. Starter Tanner Robles was the main reason for the W, keeping UVU scoreless with 7.2 solid innings of work.

Utah Valley- 000 000 000 – 0 9 1
Oregon St. – 022 500 00x – 9 7 0

WP: Tanner Robles (2-1)
LP: Zane Gray (1-2)
Save: None.

Robles was solid (9Ks, 0walks) but not spectacular (9 hits surrendered) in helping OSU breeze by the Wolverines out at one of the Royals practice fields today.

Despite being out-hit 9-to-7 in the game, the Beavers defense was pretty stoic, turning a pair of double plays and going scott-free in the error department. It also helped that Robles and reliever Nick Stiltner issued only one walk on the day and managed to strand seven UVU runners on the basepaths.

Stefen Romero was the only Beaver with multiple hits on the day (with two), but he scored the only run that was necessary when Travis Anderson knocked him in with a double in the 2nd inning. Anderson scored a batter later to put the game out of reach – so to speak – at 2-0.

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COCA-COLA NOT-SO-CLASSIC.
I don’t get the reasoning behind the scheduling here in Surprise, Arizona this weekend. Today’s three games were at 4pm, 4pm and 4:30pm, on three different fields (obviously). The UC Riverside-Arizona State game was given the marquee status and played in the big stadium that resembles a good triple-A field.

Meanwhile the two games I went back-and-forth on were played on the KC Royals’ spring training “practice” fields. So instead of having fans – or freaks like me – be able to see all three games on one field, they jammed them all together to where I had to shuttle back and forth between the FIU-Cal Poly and OSU-Utah Valley games. I was hoping to catch the end of the ASU-UCR game at the big stadium, but it went so quick, by the time I got done talking to coach Thomas of FIU, the quickly-played Sun Devils game was already long done.

Dammit people! Do we really need three different fields to play this thing? And even still, no consideration to staggering the start times? Gah! I came here for the 2008 Coca-Cola Classic and saw two games played on the main stadiums’ field. I don’t get it people.

Oh, and the games that were played at the practice fields were awful venues. It was like those softball complexes that have four fields and a snack bar in the middle of it. And each field was lined with heavy, oppressive chain link fencing that made it nearly impossible to get good pictures – or sightlines – through. Oregon State had a lot of fans in attendance and they were sitting on top of each other in the small smattering of four-level bleachers. This tournament needs some more thought to it.

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THREE UP.
The good part about college baseball today.

1- The Hot Start Teams
These teams are off to great starts, some of them being of the history-making variety. Check ‘em out…

- UCLA
Beat Nebraska 5-4 with a bottom-of-the-9th sac fly by Tyler Rahmatulla.
At 9-0, this is the best start in modern era of the program (that’s 1955 and on)

- Navy.
Beat Central Connecticut State 12-9 and 14-8.
The Mids are now 9-1 on the young season, matching their best start since 1981.

- Oklahoma.
Won its third one-run game this week, downing South Florida 4-3.
The Sooners are now 10-1 on the season and five of those wins have been saved by closer Ryan Duke.

- Louisville
Went 10 innings before beating LeMoyne 6-5.
Cade Stallings, a frosh, belted a three-run dinger to down the Dolphins in 10 innings. The Cards improve to 10-0, their best start since 1957, when they bolted out to a 15-0 record.

- Washington State.
Beat Utah 10-4 to improve to 9-0.
Off to best start since 1988 when Timm Rosenbach was quarterback. Yes, that was an attempt at humor, sorry. Wazzu has its first nine-game win streak since 1993 with today’s W.

- VMI.
Beat Maryland-Eastern Shore 20-1 to improve to 9-0.
Sure, it’s *only* UMES, but the win gets the Keydets to 9-0 for the first time in school history. Sam Roberts hit a pair of home runs to pace the offensive onslaught. This also marked the fifth time in nine games where the VMI defense did not commit an error. Smooth, man.

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2- Houston pitcher Michael Goodnight.
Beat Texas 1-0 at the Astros Classic.
In the words of famous southern comedian Jerry Clower “Good Night!” It’s been a while since Raynor Nobles charges have been able to celebrate a win over the “Big Brother” Longhorns, but his starter on the mound tonight was freakin’ NAILS! Goodnight went 7.0 innings, giving up just two measly hits, striking out nine and issuing four walks.

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3- The unbeaten road teams.
Major league props to these road warriors who are unscathed so far this weekend in tough venues.

- Oregon (3-0 at Fresno State)
Do I need to say that the Ducks are for real again? Damn man, this is pretty impressive. George Horton takes his team to another riled-up venue and comes away with a double-header sweep – by scores of 8-4 and 5-2. The Ducks gave up 20 hits on the day, but committed just one error and got early leads in both games to pace the Ws. Oh, and the Green and Gold also won on Friday, 7-2, to take a 3-0 series lead going into Sunday.

- Arkansas (2-0 at Cal)
Well, it’s not like Evans Diamond is a “tough” venue, but a trip out to Berkeley IS a long one, that’s for sure. Today, the Hogs dodged the raindrops just enough to post a 9-5 win vs. the Bears. Coupled with Friday’s 7-3 win, the Razorbacks are unbeaten heading into Sunday’s getaway game – if it gets played.

- Ole Miss (2-0 at Tulane)
Okay, okay, this is exactly your father’s Green Wave with the likes of Bogusevic and Owings or anything, but the Rebs – after looking shaky as hell losing the opener vs. Louisiana-Monroe – have to be given props for beating a good team in a big time stadium. Today they downed Tulane by a 5-1 margin. Not bad.

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HONORABLE MENTIONS:

- James Jones, P, UL-Monroe.
Threw 100 pitches, 70 for strikes, in a complete game, two-hitter to beat Mississippi Valley State 11-0. Jones also struck out six and walked one, eventually pitching to just one over the minimum on the day.

- Harvard.
Beat Notre Dame 9-6 and beat Stetson 6-5.
You don’t usually see an Ivy League team start a season with a win over a “BCS” school AND then also win at the home of a southern school, but here we are. These two wins are the first two games of the season for the Crimson.

- Troy Channing, St. Mary’s.
The super-Soph is showing no rust this season. Today, his two-run crusher in the 10th inning – his fourth home run of the season – helped the Gaels avoid the sweep at No. 13 UC Irvine with a 4-2 win in the extra frame.

- Long Beach State’s Andrew Gagnon.
Against a potent Washington offense, the Dirtbag flinger gave up just three hits, striking out four and walking two to help Long Beach beat the Huskies 3-1.

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THREE DOWN.
The bad part about college baseball today.

1- The Coca-Cola Classic.
Just like the drink, it sounds great. But in reality there are so many down sides, it’ll put holes in your teeth.

I’ve already railed on this thing enough above, so let’s just move on and hope common sense takes over this tournament in future years.

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2- Clemson
Lost to No. 19 South Carolina, 7-5.
But the reason they’re included here is because the Tigers continued to pitch to Whit Merrifield and Jackie Bradley on the night. Those two Gamecock bats went a combined five-for-nine with six ribbies on the night. In the 9th inning, Carolina rallied behind a Merrifield single that scored Scott Wingo. Then, Bradley knocked Merrifield in with a double that put Carolina into the lead for good.

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3- Georgia.
The Bulldogs look like they belong back in the junkyard with the Studebaker’s and DeSoto’s. Today, the Silver Britches took another blowout loss on the chin, losing 9-2 at Florida State. Now, it’s no great shame to lose two straight at Dick Howser Field, lordy no. But the ‘Dogs haven’t even been competitive so far, losing the first two games of the series by a combined 21-3. Woof!

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DISHONORABLE MENTIONS.

- The Pepperdine defense.
The Waves are notorious textbook defenders, but today they squandered five errors on the day in helping LSU defeat them 3-2. Of the Tigers’ three runs, only one was earned. Pepperdine had more errors (5) than hits (3) or walks earned (3). Who ARE those guys wearing the Waves uniforms today?

- Notre Dame.
Lost to both Harvard (9-6) and Kansas State (a 5-2 loss) to fall to 4-4 on the young season. I know it hasn’t been a good winter to get reps in up there in South Bend, we can give you a pass for that – but not when the losses come against teams with zero outside practices as well. Inexcusable for a team we all expected to come storming back into prominence this season. But it’s early, I know.

Okay, I’m gonna check weather.com and then hit the rack until it’s time to play some 9am baseball out at Surprise Stadium… or worse yet, out at the surrounding practice fields.

G’night.