But you wouldn’t know what long days these are by the looks of Fox Cities Stadium. And that’s a testament to the great work and long hours put in by the grounds crew here in Grand Chute. The D3baseball.com crew finally vacated the premises at 2 a.m. tonight, after uploading the nightly wrapup video. But the grounds crew remains hard at work. On Friday night, they were there until 3 a.m.

It’s not just the basics of dragging the infield and watering it down, chalking the foul lines. There’s reshaping of the mound every night, after a thousand pitches have been thrown. The home plate area is filled back in with clay, pounded down into the dirt and seemingly buffed to a shine. The first- and third-base lines are painstakingly raked into shape.

There’s a lot of hard work put in by the grounds crew, after the fans and teams are long gone. And it’s much appreciated.

Central Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Buena Vista 29-9 29-11
2. North Central (Ill.) 26-9 31-9
3. Carthage 23-13 28-16
4. North Park 24-12 28-15
5. Ripon 22-11 24-15
6. Webster 28-3 33-9

Mid-Atlantic Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Johns Hopkins 34-2 38-4
2. Kean 30-7 34-10
3. Widener 24-8 25-12
4. Alvernia 29-10 32-10
5. Keystone 27-6 29-7
6. Rowan 22-11-1 24-14-1
7. FDU-Florham 31-10 33-11
8. DeSales 22-13 25-17
9. Penn State-Behrend 28-13 29-15

Mideast Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Heidelberg 34-6 37-6
2. Wooster 30-6 34-7
3. Marietta 24-10 32-11
4. Washington and Jefferson 29-7 32-10
5. Adrian 26-11 29-11
6. Manchester 21-14 26-19
7. Thomas More 30-12 31-14

Midwest Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. UW-Whitewater 33-4 38-5
2. St. Thomas 32-6 33-7
3. St. Scholastica 31-5 38-6
4. UW-Stevens Point 25-13 29-15
5. Concordia (Ill.) 27-6 31-9
6. Bethany Lutheran 28-10 29-11

New England Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Tufts 22-3 31-5
2. Wheaton (Mass.) 30-7 32-8
3. Western New England 31-10 33-10
4. Eastern Connecticut State 25-12 30-13
5. Worcester State 30-9-1 31-9-1
6. Keene State 21-13-1 26-15-1
7. Westfield State 30-9 30-9
8. Bowdoin 22-13 25-15
9. Curry 28-12 29-13
10. WPI 23-11 23-11

New York Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. SUNY Cortland 27-4-1 32-8-1
2. St. John Fisher 27-12 28-12
3. Oneonta State 25-11 28-11
4. Plattsburgh State 18-9 30-10
5. Rochester 28-12 29-12
6. Staten Island 29-11 31-11

South Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Shenandoah 26-7 34-8
2. Salisbury 23-10 27-11
3. Mary Washington 19-11 26-12
4. York (Pa.) 28-14 28-14
5. Millsaps 23-12 25-15
6. Methodist 24-13 28-14

West Region In-Region Overall Record
1. Chapman 25-5 30-9
2. Linfield 28-7 30-10
3. Pomona-Pitzer 27-7 29-9
4. Texas-Tyler 31-9 35-10
5. Mississippi College 32-6 36-9
6. Trinity (Texas) 28-6 32-7

[Note: The above rankings do not guarantee a team’s selection into the national championship.]

The first record is regional record, followed by overall record.

Central Region :
1. Buena Vista 26-9 26-11
2. North Central (Ill.) 26-7 31-7
3. St. Norbert 20-7 23-10
4. North Park 23-10 27-13
5. Carthage 21-11 26-14
6. Webster 25-3 30-9

Mid-Atlantic Region
1. Johns Hopkins 34-2 38-4
2. Kean 28-7 32-10
3. Widener 24-8 25-12
4. Alvernia 29-10 32-10
5. Rowan 22-11-1 24-14-1
6. FDU-Florham 29-9 31-10
7. DeSales 22-13 25-17
8. Keystone 24-6 26-7
9. Frostburg State 21-7 29-11

Mideast Region
1. Heidelberg 31-6 34-6
2. Marietta 22-8 30-9
3. Washington and Jefferson 27-5 30-8
4. Wooster 30-6 34-7
5. John Carroll 21-10 25-14
6. Adrian 26-11 29-11
7. Anderson 19-9 26-14

Midwest Region
1. UW-Whitewater 30-3 35-4
2. St. Thomas 28-5 29-6
3. St. Scholastica 27-4 34-5
4. UW-Stevens Point 23-11 27-13
5. Rockford 24-12-1 26-12-1
6. Concordia (Ill.) 27-6 31-9

New England Region
1. Tufts 22-3 31-5
2. Wheaton (Mass.) 30-7 32-8
3. Western New England 31-10 33-10
4. Eastern Connecticut State 24-10 29-11
5. Keene State 20-11-1 25-13-1
6. Worcester State 30-9-1 31-9-1
7. Westfield State 30-9 30-9
8. Bowdoin 22-13 25-15
9. Curry 26-12 27-13
10. WPI 23-11 23-11

New York Region
1. Cortland State 26-4-1 31-8-1
2. St. John Fisher 27-12 28-12
3. Rochester 27-10 28-10
4. Plattsburgh State 18-9 30-10
5. Oneonta State 25-11 28-11
6. Staten Island 29-10 31-10

South Region
1. Shenandoah 26-7 34-8
2. Salisbury 23-9 27-10
3. Mary Washington 19-11 26-12
4. York (Pa.) 28-14 28-14
5. Millsaps 23-12 25-15
6. Methodist 24-13 28-14

West Region
1. Chapman 25-5 30-9
2. Linfield 28-7 30-10
3. Pomona-Pitzer 27-7 29-9
4. Texas-Tyler 31-9 35-10
5. Mississippi College 32-6 36-9
6. Trinity (Texas) 28-6 32-7

The first record is regional record, followed by overall record.

Central Region
1. Buena Vista 23-8 23-10
2. St. Norbert 14-7 17-10
3. North Central (Ill.) 23-5 28-5
4. Carthage 18-9 23-12
5. Webster 26-2 31-8
6. North Park 20-10 24-12

Mid-Atlantic Region
1. Johns Hopkins 32-1 36-3
2. Alvernia 29-8 32-8
3. Kean 25-7 29-10
4. Widener 20-6 21-10
5. Rowan 21-10-1 23-13-1
6. DeSales 21-11 24-15
7. FDU-Florham 27-7 29-8
8. Keystone 22-6 24-7
9. Frostburg State 21-7 29-11

Mideast Region
1. Heidelberg 27-6 30-6
2. Marietta 20-8 27-9
3. Washington and Jefferson 24-4 27-7
4. Wooster 30-6 34-7
5. Adrian 23-10 26-10
6. John Carroll 17-8 21-12
7. Franklin 14-6 22-10

Midwest Region
1. UW-Whitewater 28-3 33-4
2. St. Thomas 24-5 25-6
3. St. Scholastica 25-4 32-5
4. UW-Stevens Point 20-9 24-11
5. Concordia (Ill.) 25-6 29-9
6. Edgewood 20-11 24-12

New England Region
1. Tufts 19-3 27-5
2. Wheaton (Mass.) 27-7 29-8
3. Westfield State 28-7 28-7
4. Western New England 26-8 28-8
5. Eastern Connecticut State 22-9 27-10
6. Keene State 18-11-1 23-13-1
7. Bowdoin 20-9 23-11
8. Curry 25-12 26-13
9. WPI 21-10 21-10
10. Trinity (Conn.) 17-10 18-11

New York Region
1. Cortland State 25-3-1 30-7-1
2. Plattsburgh State 18-7 30-8
3. St. John Fisher 26-11 27-11
4. Rochester (New York) 27-9 28-9
5. Staten Island 27-10 30-10
6. Skidmore 20-9 25-11

South Region
1. Shenandoah 26-7 34-8
2. Mary Washington 19-9 26-10
3. York (Pa.) 28-12 28-12
4. Millsaps 23-12 25-15
5. LaGrange 24-16 26-17
6. Methodist 24-13 28-14

West Region
1. Chapman 23-4 26-8
2. Linfield 28-7 30-10
3. Pomona-Pitzer 27-7 29-9
4. Mississippi College 30-4 34-7
5. Trinity (Texas) 28-6 32-7
6. Texas Lutheran 28-11 31-11

Central Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Buena Vista 18-10 18-10
2. St. Norbert 10-6 13-9
3. North Central (Ill.) 19-5 24-5
4. Carthage 12-8 17-11
5. Webster 21-1 26-7
6. North Park 18-9 22-11

Mid-Atlantic Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Johns Hopkins 29-1 33-3
2. Alvernia 25-8 28-8
3. Kean 20-6 24-9
4. Widener 16-5 17-9
5. Rowan 18-9 20-12
6. DeSales 19-9 22-13
7. FDU-Florham 24-5 26-6
8. Keystone 20-6 22-6
9. Lebanon Valley 19-9 21-11

Mideast Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Washington and Jefferson 21-3 24-6
2. Heidelberg 23-6 26-6
3. John Carroll 16-5 20-9
4. Wooster 27-6 31-7
5. Marietta 17-7 24-8
6. Adrian 19-7 23-9
7. Franklin 13-5 21-9

Midwest Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. UW-Whitewater 22-3 27-4
2. St. Thomas 20-4 21-5
3. St. Scholastica 22-2 29-3
4. UW-Stevens Point 18-7 22-9
5. Concordia (Ill.) 21-5 25-8
6. Edgewood 16-10 19-11

New England Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Tufts 13-2 21-4
2. Wheaton (Mass.) 23-6 25-7
3. Westfield State 24-7 24-7
4. Curry 24-10 25-11
5. Western New England 26-8 28-8
6. Eastern Connecticut 19-8 24-9
7. Trinity (Conn.) 14-9 15-10
8. Amherst 15-9-1 15-10-1
9. WPI 21-10 21-10
10. Keene State 13-11-1 18-13-1

New York Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Cortland State 22-3-1 27-7-1
2. Skidmore 17-6 22-8
3. Plattsburgh State 18-7 28-8
4. Rochester 25-7 26-9
5. St. John Fisher 20-10 21-10
6. Staten Island 24-9 26-9

South Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Shenandoah 26-7 34-8
2. Mary Washington 19-9 24-10
3. Millsaps 23-12 25-15
4. Methodist 23-10 27-11
5. LaGrange 24-16 26-17
6. York (Pa.) 23-12 23-12

West Region In-Region Record Overall Record
1. Chapman 20-4 25-8
2. Pomona-Pitzer 25-6 27-8
3. Linfield 25-7 27-10
4. Mississippi College 28-4 32-7
5. Trinity (Texas) 28-6 32-7
6. Pacific Lutheran 23-7 30-7

[Note: The above rankings do not guarantee a team's selection into the national championship.]

On Tuesday, even with the rain seemingly bearing down and needing just one game to finish the season, we ended up with 21 innings — in fact, 21 innings of well-played baseball.

I’ve now been to 10 Stagg Bowls, 10 men’s basketball final fours, one women’s basketball final four, a men’s lacrosse title game and now, a Division III baseball championship. And this was just the second time in the 23 Division III championships I’ve attended that the title was decided on the very last play of the game. (The other was the 2006 men’s lacrosse championship, an overtime win for Cortland State over Salisbury.)

The tournament was about what I’d expected, though I had never sat through an entire eight-team, double-elimination tournament before.

I want to make sure Mark Miller’s clutch pitching performance doesn’t get lost in the shuffle, and with more than 50 percent of people choosing his Tuesday line as the best of the day, I think the mission has been accomplished. But there were many other sidelights and notes from the long weekend in Appleton that merit mentioning:

Tuesday was a tense day, especially if you were a Wooster fan, apparently. Former Scots player Pat Christiansen, for example, stood in the stands and paced back and forth for the entire first game and most of the second game before taking a seat for the final couple of innings.

Was it just me, or did every bang-bang call at first base seem like a 50-50 proposition? I included a photo with this blog post of a call clearly missed at first — Wooster’s Matthew Pierce is safe because you can see he’s on the bag while St. Thomas first baseman Tom Wippler has yet to land. (The photo is crooked because he’s saving Dan Leslie’s throw from flying straight over my head in the right field bullpen.) Umpiring is inconsistent everywhere, this I know, and I wouldn’t argue balls and strikes, but it didn’t seem like close plays at first base were getting called correctly with any regularity.

In talking with the NCAA’s director of umpires, George Drouches, I learned that the eight umpires selected are taken one from each region, and while in other Division III championships events some pains are taken to make sure a neutral crew works championship games, the only precaution here is that an umpire doesn’t work behind the plate in a game involving a team he’s called games for before. But while Carlos Guzman (who worked the Mid-Atlantic Regional) wasn’t calling balls and strikes when Kean played in Appleton, he worked third base, and was involved in the most controversial call of the tournament.

After the first two days, Drouches told me, umpires were re-evaluated and scheduled for the final seven games, including the six-umpire crews for the championship games.

Carthage and Shenandoah should be given credit for having the best fans. In fact, Carthage had avid tailgaters, who were there when we arrived for the tournament’s opening game at 8 a.m. last Friday. Not that I was surprised: I’ve seen it before, when Keith McMillan and I traveled to Chicago a couple of years ago for D3football.com. Before heading to our 1 p.m. game, we drove by and saw some of the other stadiums in the area, including North Park, where Carthage was playing that afternoon. We got there three hours before the game. Brats were on the grill. The Carthage-Shenandoah game was the best of the tournament that didn’t involve St. Thomas and Wooster, so it was nice that it was played in front of the largest actual crowd.

I commented on yesterday’s blog post about the St. Thomas and Wooster players standing in line at the concession stand between games buying hot dogs, etc., for their pregame meal. But it wasn’t the meal of choice most days. I saw far more ice cream being consumed by players than any other food stuff. But the brats were my waistline’s weapon of choice.

St. Thomas and Wooster also had two-sport athletes play prominent roles this week. Ben Wartman, a D3football.com All-Region running back for St. Thomas, played catcher and started in the second championship game. We wrote about Matt DeGrand, who plays outside linebacker and threw the game of his life for Wooster in the win against St. Thomas. Also, Tyler Hadzinsky plays goalie and second base for Chapman and was an Academic All-American in both. I know these are not the only two-sport players at the tournament, but these were the ones that stuck out.

I was disappointed that there were only three radio crews among the eight schools, though I know that’s about par for the course. But the most interesting broadcast, in my mind, was Shenandoah’s, with a player on color (Bryan Claudio) who had done play-by-play for the team for some games online. We shared a press box room with them for one game and it was well done.

Chapman’s Wayde Kitchens told us he didn’t even bring his cleats to Appleton, but he didn’t tell us what his injury was. We found out after the tournament that it’s a tendon in his pitching arm that’s causing him trouble.

We’ll have more coverage still to come. Keep an eye out for the audio from the postgame news conference with St. Thomas, so you can listen to the coach and player’s first public reaction to winning Walnut and Bronze.

Well, at least the first one after the shouting and the piling.

Carthage and St. Thomas are up first. The pitching staffs are getting thin so load up those bats. Carthage showed us that they are capable of giving up the big lead and preserving. Will St. Thomas bounce back after last nights loss. We will know in just a few hours.

Wooster will be playing loose as they are assured at least one shot at the championship. Tim Pettorini will be resting Swearingen and keeping McDowell and Miller on the bench. For Chapman there is a sense of urgency. Win today or get ready to unpack those golf clubs for the Panthers.

Our predictions for today are for St. Thomas to bounce back and get a date with Chapman on Tuesday.can i take viagra! Cialis Viagra On Line viagra how it works,
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Jeff Sackmann has put together a simulation for the D-III Championship at http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/small-college-world-series-odds/

A fair ranking, although I would not make the list exactly the same, The biggest surprise is who ends up on top. Will this be the year that a Championship rookie takes home the Walnut and Bronze? This has happened in the past with Ramapo and George Fox, winners in their only appearance to date.

Tradition says. There are a long line of teams making their first trio going home 0-2. This is the past and we had Adrian doing quite well and Wheaton making a run, ending up just short.

There are records to be broken this year and the first in 2009 will be career appearances. Once they take the field, the Matt Pearson, Patrick Ohail, Tristan Phillips, and Wayde Kitchens will join past teammate, Kyle Redding, with their fourth appearance in the championship. This will bring the number of players with four appearances to 23.

Hope to see as many as I can. Don’t a stranger and introduce yourself to me at the ball park. I’ll be the one in my traditional hawai’ian shirt and yellow ball cap.

I am off to see a little practice and reacquaint myself with Fox Cities Stadium.

I drove home last night from the South Regional of the NCAA Division III National Championship Tournament where I watched my son play in his last college baseball game. His team lost 11-7 in the title game. When I got home around midnight, I drank a beer before going to bed. Beer doesn’t taste as good when your kid’s team loses. I thought about how fast those four years flew by and how much my son had grown. He added an inch in height and thirty-five pounds in weight. He added five miles-per-hour to his fastball (but in my opinion, he lost some movement on it). He added enough whiskers to his chin to achieve “scruff”, and he added enough years to his age to get served at the local hangout using his own ID. He added several hundred friends to his Facebook page and several hundred words to his vocabulary—words like “grit” and “commitment” and “dependability”. He learned that “camaraderie” is not just about sharing laughs with your teammates (there were many) but also tears (there were some).

I got up this morning and did something I haven’t done in four years—cleaned out the trunk of my car. You see, we always took my car to the game.

The first thing I pulled out of the trunk was an old laundry basket that contained hooded sweatshirts, ear muffs and gloves, a blanket, some towels, and a yellow rain slicker that I paid way too much for at the University Bookstore because I needed to be standing at the fence for a double header in a persistent drizzle. We won’t be needing that gear in the trunk anymore because now we don’t have to go to games if the weather is bad.

I took out the folding picnic table and lawn chairs and put them away. It will seem really strange from now on to get that table out and put sandwiches on it and not have thirty-five dirty, sweaty, smelly baseball players line up to grab some food and act like it was the best meal they ever had in their lives.

I found a folder with several dozen MapQuest printouts to places like Collegeville, Pennsylvania; Danville, Virginia; Salisbury, Maryland; and Appleton, Wisconsin. I started to throw it away, then I thought, “No, it would be fun to go back to those places.” I recalled some lines from a Robert Frost poem about “knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back,” and I threw the folder out.

There were several large bags of sunflower seeds that never made it into the dugout basket. I think I’ll give those to the Little Leaguer down the street so he can start honing that particular baseball skill. I’m sure his mom won’t mind.

I found my white baseball cap with the blue jay on the front. It had been relegated to the trunk after a determination that its good luck value was limited to non-conference games at Homewood.

As I was about to shut the trunk, my neighbor spotted me and walked over. Finding me bleary-eyed and sniffling, he asked if I was okay. I smiled for him and explained, “Allergies.”

Busy day of Division III baseball. They are indeed playing at Oshkosh — the Net connection in the press box needs to be looked at and a tech has been dispatched but they aren’t expecting to be up and running with live stats until 1 p.m. ET. St. Olaf and Beloit were scoreless in the fourth when we called for an update a few minutes ago.

Been watching the New England video out of the corner of my eye and it’s been a great production so far. Not quite what D3Cast provided from Harwich in terms of replays and graphics in previous years, but the call of the game is solid and there are multiple camera angles to choose from, so it’s definitely worth your time.

Still trying to track down more audio links. Just uncovered that UW-Whitewater will have its games on the local radio and audio stream, so we’ve added that to the Scoreboard page. That’s if the Central Regional gets that game in today. They’re meeting in Moline at 2 p.m. ET to see if they can find a window to squeeze games into. If they decide to get that first game underway, it would probably be around 4 p.m. ET.

Consider this a central meeting place to discuss all eight regionals. We’ll be up late tonight.