The MSU baseball team did finish its season losing three of its last four games, but the Spartans were close to winning almost all of their last nine games.
"We should have won all four games against Penn State, but we made some critical errors," MSU manager Ted Mahan said. "Then we were ahead 10-0 in the first game at Northwestern, so having said all that, we were very close to at least 7-2.
"If you look at how dominant we were in a few of those games, it's a sign of things to come. I really think our future showed the last nine games."
The Spartans (22-31 overall, 10-18 Big Ten) lost junior second baseman Oliver Wolcott and sophomore catcher/first baseman Sean Walker in the middle of the season to injury. Both were starters, and Mahan said the loss of Walker was a big blow at a critical time.
The loss of those two players, plus the fact that MSU went all season without starting pitchers junior Dan Noble and sophomore Spencer Hahn, due to injury, forced others to step into starting roles and Mahan to play less experienced players.
"We were young, but we tried not to use that as an excuse," starting pitcher Tim Day said. "But at the end of the year, we ended up starting four freshman, four sophomores and one senior.
The Spartans will return 32 of 33 players next season, while bringing in only three new recruits. Also, the Spartans play 27 home games next year, including five straight weekends at Kobs Field. All of that is a different story than this season, in which the Spartans played only 15 home games, Mahan said.
"It seems to go in cycles here at Michigan State, where we have a couple good teams, then down (a couple years), hopefully in the next year or two it will be back up," Day said.
The coach and players said the team has already talked about next year and how much they are looking forward to the experience of this year paying off in 2006.
"We're definitely going to do some damage in the Big Ten over the next couple years," sophomore left fielder Ryan Basham said. "We have this much talent; we can't let it go to waste."
As for the successes of the young Spartans this year, they had four players recognized by the Big Ten on Tuesday. Freshman center fielder Ryan Sontag was named Big Ten Freshman of the Year, the first time a Spartan has captured the award.
Sontag hit .349, with one home run and 17 RBIs and smacking 10 doubles and two triples in 41 starts. He was also named to the All-Big Ten Second Team, as one of the four outfielders.
Three other Spartans were recognized on the All-Big Ten Third Team: sophomore starting pitcher Craig Brookes, Basham and sophomore shortstop Troy Krider, who received the same number of votes as Iowa's Andy Lytle.
Basham was named MSU's Most Valuable Player and the Offensive Player of the Year. He hit for a .356 average, eight home runs and 12 doubles, starting every game.
Brookes was voted the MSU Pitcher of the Year, with a 4.84 ERA and a 6-1 record in 13 starts. He threw two complete games and was 4-0 in Big Ten games.
Krider led the Big Ten in hitting in conference games only with a .405 average and four home runs and 25 RBIs in 28 games. Krider also started all 53 games for MSU.
Sontag earned the team's Defensive Player of the Year, and sophomore Adam Tripp was named the Most Improved Player. Day won the Craig Hendricks Sportsmanship Award for leadership on and off the field, and sophomore catcher Kris Morris was the presented the Bullpen Club Academic Award for his 3.43 grade-point average.
