The Fresno State Bulldogs were thwarted in their first attempt to make it to the College World Series final series, as North Carolina rallied for a 4-3 victory on Saturday night to force a rematch today, with the winner moving on to face Georgia. Now, normally, I wouldn't pay too much attention to the College World Series - somehow, I've managed to remain immune to the "ping" of metal bats. But...Fresno State's run to the precipice of the College World Series final series is significant enough to make me care, and that's not just because I grew up 20 miles away from Fresno.
What Fresno State is attempting to pull off, frankly, would be the equivalent of a No. 16 seed winning the NCAA Men's Basketball tournament. Quite literally - they were a No. 4 seed out of four teams in their sub-regional - essentially one of the 16 lowest-ranked teams in the tournament (so I guess they could have been as high as a No. 13 seed, but...quit ruining the narrative with your math, Mr. Math!). After making it through that, they took down nationally-ranked Arizona St. on the road to punch their ticket to Omaha - despite the Sun Devils' "fake fight", which I haven't mentioned here yet, but it's one of the stupid things I've ever heard of. Even my kickball team - the one that almost burned down our park this season - wouldn't pull something that stupid.
It's pretty amazing stuff. As I've mentioned here before, the local community has a special bond with Fresno State teams, especially the baseball team, which is almost entirely made up of players from the area. The whole Central Valley will rally around a Fresno State team when it does well, especially because in each local town like Visalia or Turlock or Hanford, there is a kid that plays on the team, and that they can rally behind. At least, they would if everyone in town wasn't too busy hiding out in their houses with the air conditioning cranked up, afraid to turn the TV on for fear that the heat from the TV will be the tipping point that causes the house to catch fire.
