![]() “On our way up there, we will relax and be as loose as we can be,” DeCourcey told The Telegraph’s Steve Porter before leaving for Springfield 40 years ago. But he was already seasoned enough to know the tension that came with the program’s first state trip two years earlier needed an escape outlet. When he retired in 2009, only three other coaches had won more games at one school.ĭeCourcey was just eight years older than his best players in 1980. ![]() DeCourcey would remain in that job for 33 years that brought a 641-351 record and Hall of Fame reverence. Greg DeCourcey had been hired in 1977 at age 23 to be the Explorers head coach. In 1979, Marquette went 22-6 and was eliminated by Virden in the sectional title game. The Explorers reached state in ’78, losing to Vienna in the quarterfinals to cap a 20-7-1 season. The IHSA’s two-class split for baseball – placing schools with enrollments at 750 or fewer in Class A – in 1978 punched Marquette’s ticket to postseason powerhouse. Louis Cardinals.Īnd the time was right for Marquette - then a school of about 600 students - to ascend. When Marquette was able to survive the state quarterfinals – it went 3-4 in those games – it never lost a semifinal and claimed state championships in 1980 and ‘84 and a runner-up finish in 1988.īut the launching pad for Marquette’s baseball tradition came from 1980 when a squad featuring a pair or brothers in the outfield, a pair of aces on the mound and a ‘Whiteyball’ approach baserunning abandon two years before that term was coined for Whitey Herzog’s World Series champion St. Tossing in the last two years of the ‘70s to span a dozen baseball seasons from 1978-89, the Explorers won 11 regional championships and seven sectional titles that sent them to seven state tourneys that then featured an Elite Eight bracket of eight qualifiers. Marquette Explorers baseball owned the 1980s. It marked the second time a team from Sullivan County won a pro baseball title, and the first since the Catskill Cougars in 1996.But splitting the difference to revisit 40 years ago – June 3, 1980, to be precise – Marquette Catholic was reveling in the jubilation of a Class A baseball state championship earned on a Tuesday night at Robin Roberts Stadium in Springfield.Īlton mayor Paul Lenz declared Wednesday, June 4 to be “Marquette Victory Day.” Turned out be more of a Victory Decade. Despite the fact that the series was held in Watertown, the Explorers swept the Bucks, 8-6 and 8-7, to take the 2016 Empire League championship. Mired in third place in the four-team EPBL, the Explorers won their last eight games to finish 28-25 and slip into second place, good enough to qualify for the best-of-three championship series against the Watertown Bucks, who won both halves of the regular-season title with a 35-21 record. The Explorers were originally announced to move to Rome, New York and play in the newly-formed Empire Baseball League, until the franchise settled in Sullivan County. Brian Hoover, a 38 year old rookie, made headlines as he signed with the Explores mid season. ![]() The Explorers promoted eight players to the Atlantic League and American Association. The Explorers led the up start league with a 22-17 record. The restructuring resulted in the Explorers being taken over by Eddie Gonzalez as manager and Robert Babiak as general manager. Prior the planned start of the ECBL's first season the American teams, including the Explorers, pulled of the league to form the North Country Baseball League. The team was to be managed by Spencer Trygg. In 2015 the Road City Explorers were set to be a member of the East Coast Baseball League.
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