Chapman baseball reflects on championship mentality post-Dodgers win

Chapman’s baseball team can relate to the feelings of winning a World Series title, given their 2019 NCAA Division III championship. Photo courtesy of D3Photography.com

The elation of success: it’s a feeling everyone chases throughout their professional lives. For many, that’s an ambiguous goal. Yet in the case of sports, there’s a clear title at the end of a season that represents that success – and only a few throughout history are lucky to capture it. 

The Los Angeles Dodgers have won their first championship since 1988, defeating the Tampa Bay Rays Oct. 27 in Game 6 of the 2020 World Series. It had been a long road for L.A. – the title came after controversy in the 2017 World Series following a loss to the Houston Astros, who were found to be cheating throughout the season. 

After the victory, the euphoria and relief on the faces of Dodger players was evident, having overcome a history of postseason struggles. 

Chapman baseball knows a little bit about what that feels like.

In June 2019, the baseball team defeated Birmingham-Southern College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to win the NCAA Division III World Series.

“The exuberance of having all of (that) come to fruition was amazing,” said Chapman head coach Scott Laverty. “The extra time with the guys to try to help them with their individual game – seeing that come through is true bliss to a coach.”

It wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows in the Panther dugout. There were some serious nerves, recalled senior first baseman Hank Zeisler.

“It’s a different kind of stressful,” Zeisler said. “I remember vividly there’d be times in the dugout where my stomach hurt. I’d never understood how people could feel that way in sports, but now I can see how that’d happen.”

However, Laverty said the pressure didn’t weigh nearly as heavily on him, or the rest of the coaching staff, in their championship run.

“From a coaching perspective, the hard work comes from getting them to that point to play their best baseball when it matters most,” Laverty said. “I’d say (the pressure) is even less … I tell them, ‘Game time is your time.’”

Despite the nerves and pressure on the team to perform, they held a shared confidence that they’d see their run through.

“We won the (Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference) tournament, all right. We won the regional, all right,” Zeisler said. “After we won the super regional we were like, ‘We’re doing this. We’re going to win.’”

As the team hit a groove, so did Zeisler. After the victory, the then-sophomore collected the Most Outstanding Player Award by D3baseball.com for the postseason.

“I got hot at the right time and did my thing,” Zeisler said. “Going into the championship series, one announcer told me, ‘Regardless of how you do, you look like a lock for (the award),’ which was really cool.”

Would Zeisler, or the team, do anything differently over the past couple of seasons? 

“No,” Zeisler said, simply. 

One can imagine the Dodgers feel the same way.