CLEMSON BASEBALL

No secret sauce for these Tigers, just hard, dirty work
Ryan Ammons celebrates with the ACC Championship trophy.

No secret sauce for these Tigers, just hard, dirty work


by - Senior Writer -

DURHAM, NC – Clemson head Erik Bakich stood in the rain for a few last seconds, watching his players and coaches celebrate an ACC Championship before heading off to do a television interview. For him, Team 126 will always be special.

Clemson defeated Miami 11-5 Sunday afternoon at Durham Bulls Athletic Park to clinch the ACC title. The win was an incredible 16th in a row for a Tiger team that is getting hot at the right time. The road was never easy – the Tigers started 17-14 overall and limped out to a 2-8 start in ACC play.

After losing the series opener at Florida State on April 6, many thought the program was simply in rebuilding mode. But Bakich never wavered in his faith that this team had plenty of talent and plenty of fight.

Why? Because Team 126 is special.

“Team 126, this team will be talked about to so many future generations of Clemson Tigers,” Bakich said after the game. “Any time you hit a rough patch, any time you have a rough start, any time you have some adversity, we’re going to talk about, ‘Remember what Team 126 did.’ First 31 games of the year we were 17-14. The first 10 conference games we were 2-8.”

Bakich said the players never wavered, even in the face of adversity.

“These guys had a decision to make — transitions are never easy — but it could have been for them to maybe lose the buy-in, or decide they want to change something up or do something different,” Bakich said. “And to this team’s credit, to the players’ credit, they did not deviate, they did not buckle, they did not get rattled, not for one second. They stayed with it, they stayed positive, they stayed connected to each other. They kept working extremely hard. They knew that we were better than what we were showing, and it’s one thing to say it, it’s another thing to do it — and these guys started doing it.”

Clemson was swept by top-ranked Wake Forest – the team that won the ACC regular season – at home in late March. But the final two games were one-run losses, and Bakich said he could feel the tide turning. Most people chalked it up to coach-speak.

“We knew we were right there. We were just not quite over the hump, but it’s not like we were getting blown out, so I think there was a belief system that we’re close,” Bakich said. “And we just need to stick with it. We need to stay positive, we need to keep working relentlessly, and this thing is gonna turn. And sure enough, it did.”

Second baseman Riley Bertram was with Bakich at Michigan, and called it an easy choice to follow the staff to Clemson for his final season. It was Bertram’s three-run homer in the seventh Sunday that gave the Tigers a 7-5 lead.

It didn’t take long for Bertram to be named a team captain, a mantle of leadership he takes seriously, but he credited players like Caden Grice and Cam Cannarella for providing the star power.

“Whenever you have that adversity at the start of the season, you really need your star players — like Caden and Cooper and Cam — you really need them to buy in and lock down, and they did that,” Bertram said. “It kind of allowed the other guys to build off that, and it was cool to see them do that, really to just put the trust in this coaching staff and believe in what they were saying and doing was for a good reason, and it’s always rewarding to see it pay off.”

For Bakich, he can’t tell you a certain button that was pushed or a single moment when it all turned around. It was all just dirty, hard work.

“There was no secret sauce, magic pill. It was just dirty, hard work,” Bakich said. “They just kept their head down, and just each day, each week, each game, they just kept fighting. And I will always be forever grateful to them for that and proud of what this group has accomplished and is still doing. But all the credit goes to these guys for how they have turned this season around and got us to the point where we are now. Just very appreciative to them and what they mean to the future of this program.”

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