NCAA Starkville Super Regional: Notre Dame Quotes (June 14, 2021)

NCAA Starkville Super Regional
Postgame Press Conference – Game 3
Notre Dame
June 14, 2021

Notre Dame Head Coach Link Jarrett

Q: What's going to be your message to the team?
LJ: "Well, you learn a lot when you're in this environment. You also learn how beneficial it is to be at home for this event. Thought we had a chance to do that, we probably ended up at the most passionate baseball fan base in the country. There's a few that are in this conversation, but we learned a lot. I felt like our team learned how to win, felt like we learned how to play as a team. We were not good enough today. We could not get out of our own way on the mound early in the game. [John Michael] Bertrand probably pitched better today than he did when he started Saturday, quite frankly, and we did not know how that was going to go for him. He hadn't done that before, and I didn't want to ever put anyone in a position of not feeling comfortable with that type of assignment, or even request to see if you were available. He thought he could get us an inning, maybe two, and once he got into it, we felt really good. There were some guys that went out there today on the mound that felt this stage for the first time. We had minimal experience on the pitching staff, and those guys got their feet wet, and it didn't go the way we had planned. I thought we battled throughout the entire game. [Mississippi State] is a really good baseball team. They're athletic, they have arms one after the other that are all very good. They're well-coached, and they were better tonight."

Q: How disappointing is it to get this close to the College World Series and just miss out, and can you reflect on how special this season was?
LJ: "It really stinks. We knew this was a very tough draw. Again, [Mississippi State] is an elite team, and it's just unfortunate that you feel like you have a team that's capable and belongs in Omaha, and you run into this group in their stadium, and I tip my hat to their team and their crowd. I do feel like our guys learned a lot, and I felt like they competed and battled. There were moments where I felt like we played our style of baseball, there were other moments where we didn't pitch or defend at the level we did this year. This is not a forgiving stadium, and it really is a tough pill to swallow to know that you were nine innings away, and the second inning was just simply too much to overcome with the arms that they have. This season in general, we've played 60 games with me here now, so we really have one season under our belt. Watching them learn and adapt to what we're trying to do is remarkable. I've never had a group, as a head coach or assistant coach, adapt to a system the way these guys did. They're intelligent kids. They're in tune with what they're doing, they work. I just can't say enough about the progress that these individuals made, and when individuals make those sort of strides and commitments you can see the team play at a very high level, and I think we saw that throughout the entire season. I don't think in those 60 games we lost two in a row. But this one is all it takes in this setting, and they were better today."

Q: How do you feel about what kind of team you have next year, and will John Michael [Bertrand] return?
LJ: "He'll be back. We'll probably lose [Tanner] Kohlhepp in the draft, we'll lose [Niko] Kavadas. And then you have some of the seniors, they have to number one: get into grad school to have a chance [for another year of eligibility], but we don't lose much. Now, Kavadas, that's a huge part of your team. Kohlhepp was very effective, but you would hope some of the recruiting that we've been able to do, like this group coming in the majority of them are our recruits, not all. We picked up a transfer last week on the mound that will help us. We have to get better on the mound. In this setting, the stuff and the ability to strike people out. We went 22 batters before we struck one out tonight, and that's very difficult. We have the capability to do it, but we got in position to strike some people out and didn't make pitches to put people away. We have to learn to get a little better in some of those facets on the mound, and hopefully we just continue to mature offensively and learn our positions, defensively. Nobody in the infield has ever played these positions until now. We're still learning, but it obviously looks very bright if you want to look at next year right now."

Q: How do you balance the disappointment of tonight with what you were able to do all season? You also felt like you should've been playing at home this weekend.
LJ: "It's tricky to win these on the road, and we got [matched up with] a very good team. A national championship-caliber team, and I felt like we were in that conversation. When you win the conference by five games outright, I was frustrated we weren't a national seed, because as a coach I ask myself, 'what more could a team do when you have to play that many conference games and you're the only team that's separated itself from the field.' Our league was very good. It is designed for you to have an easier path when you're at home, no doubt about it. The field, the fans, the dimensions that you're accustomed to, that's the advantage. And when you have the largest crowd in the history of a three-game college series here, you know that factors in. I don't think that overwhelmed our team by any stretch, but it does give the home team that little bit of edge and energy and the timing of the energy helps. I don't know why we weren't [at home], I'll find out. I don't know."

Q: Niko Kavadas, the player and the person, what has he meant to the program? And has any desire been expressed by [Jared] Miller, [Spencer] Meyers, [Ryan] Cole, [or] [David] LaManna to return next year?
LJ: "Absolutely, and I'm not prepared to get into those conversations right now. But we have discussed it. Niko Kavadas is an intense, very productive first-class player, first-class person, team captain, delivered for us, helped our team evolve into a championship team. These guys were a championship team. It doesn't feel like it right now, but they won two championships. Not easy to do, and he was right there in the middle of it and watching him mature as a hitter and learn how to play first base, and when he gets going, he can carry any team at any level. He's remarkable. Very talented, and he's not played his last game by any stretch. He'll be just as good with the wood bat. I can't say enough about him and him guiding us through our transition, which as a coach, is difficult. The guys bought in, and he was a big part of it."

Q: What can you say about the seniors' leadership as a whole for this group and what they've meant to the team?
LJ: "Well, leadership starts with on-field performance and work. Those guys put in the work in all areas. Don't think the effort in the classroom goes unnoticed at Notre Dame when you have a 3.2 GPA as a team. Remarkable guys, and you need your older players to set the tone and lead, and you get in this moment, and you see them do that, that's what good older players do. They did it defensively, they did it offensively. It's a great group, and if you don't have the older players buying in trying to turn something around, you're set back [for] years. There's no doubt those guys led the way and our transition, completely redoing every facet of the program. They were the leaders of that charge and it paid off."

Q: What did you notice in that second inning with guys having a hard time finding the zone?
LJ: "I don't know. [Will] Mercer, his velocity was five or six miles per hour—the first couple of pitches weren't even close to what his normal velocity is. I thought that scoreboard was spot-on the whole time. I was concerned after three pitches. He started to settle down, but it just was not in the cards. We thought [Alex] Rao, looking at this, having been out there in that the night before and having pitched okay—and he's a lot different than Mercer. So we thought that might be a good matchup, and his changeup when its working has gotten him some punchouts. Didn't today. Liam [Simon] had no feel for the zone whatsoever. [If] I had a do-over again knowing what I know now about how [John Michael] Bertrand actually felt once we tried to get him going, that would've been a move to inject him there in the middle of that, but we thought we only had an inning with him. Joe [Sheridan] was okay, but the ball was up. We weren't effective at all [with] the first four guys that ran out there. They will make you pay. They're physical, they're balanced, they're athletic and when you're up in the zone in the middle of the plate, they are going to throttle it. And they did and they laid off some tough pitches and drew some walks, and the wheels started to roll. A really tough second inning. Tough to absorb, tough to strategize through, tough to shake off, tough to process. But those three guys are going to learn. They have never experienced this, and unfortunately the experience right now was bad. But that's part of the deal, we have to grow up a little bit and be better."

Carter Putz | Designated Hitter

Q: What about the first few innings made it so devastating and how do you make sure you build on this breakthrough season for the program?
CP: "We kind of dug ourselves into a little bit of a hole. One thing I will say is that we never gave up. We fought until the final out, and I think we have to use this as fuel and remember what all the seniors and grad students taught us this year. [We have to] use that as motivation and continue to carry out this goal of getting to Omaha."

Q: How is the team feeling and how special was this season for you guys?
CP: "Obviously, everybody is pretty upset. We truly believed that we were going to make it to Omaha. This season was unbelievable. This was the tightest group of guys that I've been around, the hardest working group, and so this season was unbelievable. It was the most fun I've ever had playing baseball, and these will be some of my best friends for the rest of my life. This journey was amazing. We came up a little bit short, but I just love these guys."

Q: What did Link Jarrett do to turn this program around so quickly and convincingly?
CP: "The biggest thing was that he brought a culture that everyone bought into. We believe that we can be in Omaha every single year. It's a culture where we all trust each other, and we believe in one another. When you have a group of guys that believe in the culture and believe in each other, you can go really far, and I think that's the biggest thing. We have to use it as motivation, continue to work, and hopefully get back to Omaha next year."

Q: What is your relationship like with Niko Kavadas and what have he and the rest of the seniors meant to this team?
CP: "Over the past two years, Niko [Kavadas] and I have become really close. We're with each other every single day. That's one of my best friends. He has taught me so much, not only at first base, but [with] hitting and just being able to pick his brain. As for the rest of the teammates, they started this. We looked up to them as underclassmen. They showed us the ropes and we can't thank them enough for everything that they've done for us. It was a special year, and we promise to keep this dream going. We'll make it back to Omaha."

Q: What was the message from coach after the game and what are your thoughts going forward for next year?
CP: "We actually haven't had our team talk yet. Everyone is still trying to take all this in. For me, I'm looking forward to next year. Tonight is going to push me harder than anything ever has before. We're going to work harder and we're going to use this as motivation, as I alluded to earlier, and make it to Omaha."

Q: What was Houston Harding doing early on to keep you guys off base?
CP: "He was mixing pitches really well. He was using that changeup, one of his go-to pitches, and using his off-speed curveball slider, then he would try to speed us back out with a fastball. He was throwing to both sides of the plate, mixing well, and just really kept us off balance the first few innings."

Q: Were you surprised that Landon Sims came in when he did?
CP: "No, we weren't really surprised. Obviously, that's their guy. We were all pretty excited. We saw him a couple days ago and he got us, so we were getting ready to go, but it didn't go our way today. He's a great pitcher. It's tough to string a lot of hits together, so we knew we had to make every contact count."

Q: What made this group so resilient all season?
CP: "That's just how our group is. We fell behind multiple times throughout the year, so it just shows you how resilient and tough this team was. That's part of the culture that Coach Jarrett's implemented here, and we embraced it. We loved being the underdog the whole year, and we never felt that we were out of games. Especially with that trust we have in each other. We always thought we could come back and win every single game."

Mississippi State University Athletics