On March 12, Western Kentucky’s baseball team had just departed for Birmingham, Ala. for a three-game series at UAB.
The Hilltoppers were on the road for 15 minutes – at most – before the news broke that Conference USA had suspended all sport activity due to the coronavirus pandemic. The team’s bus pulled over at a gas station, they received the official word and then turned around and headed back to campus.
Four days later the league officially canceled all spring sport competition and championships and WKU’s 2019 season was brought to an end after just 16 games. Coach John Pawlowski’s Toppers finished the campaign 10-6 overall while not playing a single conference game.
“I think when we first got the notification from Coach P and him saying we were going to turn around, I was sitting in the back of the bus with Kevin (Lambert) and we were like, ‘Is this real? Are we really getting ready to turn around from this series?’, redshirt junior right-handed pitcher Bailey Sutton said. “We were all tore up about it. The season was over, it was our last time playing together and it seemed real at that point.”
WKU was off to a solid start to the season. It won its opening series against Valpo, won a midweek game against Murray State, claimed a series over Wright State, won another midweek game against Austin Peay and took another pair of series wins over USC Upstate and Purdue.
The series at UAB would’ve been the squad’s first C-USA games of the year, but that – along with some big meetings later in the season with teams such as Louisville and Vanderbilt – were all halted.
The season was over – just like that.
“I think for any student-athlete that was playing during that time, in our case baseball players, it’s devastating – especially for those seniors and the time they went through not knowing whether they were going to be granted another year,” Pawlowski said. “I’ve been doing this for quite a while, and I told our staff, ‘I really don’t have any experience to put our players at ease going through this because I’ve never been through it – none of us have.’
“It’s been an unbelievable challenge. Our coaches have done a tremendous job of staying connected and in-tuned to what’s going on with our recruits, with our guys coming back, with our current team.”
Although there was much disappointment and sadness scattered throughout the program, WKU – and Division I spring sport athletes all over the country – received some positive light on March 30 when the NCAA Division I council announced that spring athletes would be granted an extra year of eligibility.
Of WKU’s eight seniors – Jack Lambert, Jack Wilson, Ray Zuberer III, Colby Taylor, Kevin Lambert, Matt Phipps, Sam McElreath and Richard Constantine, Pawlowski didn’t confirm who would be returning, but said he expected most or all of his 2019 seniors to be back in 2020.
However, one of those seniors confirmed he would indeed be back in the Red and White next season.
“I’m glad the NCAA made the decision to allow us to come back,” Lambert said. “For me personally, it was an easy decision for me. I love baseball and I want to win a championship next year, so I made the decision to come back next year. I’m just very grateful that the NCAA made that decision, and it’s going to be really good for college baseball next year.”
With COVID-19 implementing social distancing and stay-at-home rules across the globe, WKU’s coaching staff and players have been able to do something they don’t get to do very often – spend quality time at home with their families.
“The one thing is we take for granted the time we have with our families,” Pawlowski said. “When you’re coaching, the hours and the impact it has on your personal lives and family lives is unbelievable. You really don’t realize how much you’re gone. When you have an opportunity to be home with family and reconnect with them, I mean just to sit around and play a game of Checkers. We had a national championship Checkers tournament last week and I happened to be the winner.”
