From 1987-90, seeing John Surane at Brown-Stroud Field was like seeing the sun come up in the morning.
But time marches on, college days end, and John graduated after being a big part of the greatest turnaround in NSU athletic history.
In the first year under coach Jim Wells, Surane's senior season of 1990, the Demons on the diamond won their first 20 games -- still a state record and ranking among the nation's all-time best streaks. The final 38-13 record was the first winning season for NSU in baseball since 1978.
Surane manned second base and left a tremendous impact. No. 15 set seven school hitting records and starting in a record 151 consecutive games, the last 51 as the Demons led the NCAA in 1990 with a .981 team fielding percentage. At one point, the Demons went 14 straight games without an error. Surane fielded .984 while capping his career by playing in his 200th game in Purple and White, another school record.
He set single-season (44) and career (118) marks for runs scored, and the career hits mark was his with 173. He set the career standard for at-bats (623) and walks drawn (113). Surane was fourth in the Southland Conference with 24 steals as a senior while hitting .302 with 3 HR and 11 doubles.
The Shreveport-Loyola product earned first-team All-Southland Conference honors, then went on to play minor league ball with the Atlanta Braves, but he didn't leave without a business degree.
He's been back to visit since, but it was still a bit of a shock to walk up to the top of the hill Wednesday night at Brown-Stroud Field and have athletics director Greg Burke ask if I'd seen Surane yet. Surreal, I thought.
I didn't know I'd walked right past his wife and elementary-school aged daughter, who was playing on the hillside behind the Demons dugout.
That soon became apparent when John found me and we visited. His daughter took a little tumble and Daddy calmed her down. We laughed a minute later at the misery he experienced on the same hillside in decidedly different circumstances.
Demon baseballers through the years, and definitely during the Wells Era, viewed that hillside like those with a fear of heights look at Mount Everest.
Football coach Scott Stoker, who was playing for the Demons football team while Surane was on the baseball team, was with us. Surane, who was wearing golf gear, credited Stoker with teaching him how to play at the Demon Hills course on campus.
It will surprise nobody who knew him then that John is doing very well in business. He lives in the Chicago area and is president of Skil Power Tools since May 1, 2006.
He had been senior vice-president of sales for Bosch where he spent three years overseeing North American sales for Bosch, Skil, Dremel and Rotozip branded tools and accessories.
Skil specializes in portable electric power tools and accessories serving both the consumer and professional construction markets. According to the www.skilshop.com website, "Founded in 1924 as the Michel Electric Handsaw Company and renamed Skilsaw® Inc. in 1926, Skil has become one of the most recognized and powerful brands in the power tool industry. From circular saws and jigsaws to sanders and drills, Skil power tools are engineered to deliver the high-performance and durability that today's growing population of Do-It-Yourselfers demand."
But if you were handy around the house, you probably already knew that.
I had to go to the internet to find out.
Safe to say that Surane, always great with a glove, now helps lots of people with gloves.
But he's not at all too big for his shoes.
Doug Ireland, SID
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Skipper and a trip to Camelot
First-year Demon baseball head coach J.P. Davis is no rookie.
Pitching coach for NSU over the past seven years, he knows the territory around campus, around the Southland Conference and in Louisiana.
And, of course, he's firmly entrenched in college baseball circles.
None of which was required to realize that getting five-time national champion coach Skip Bertman to speak to his team Tuesday was a tremendous gift.
Most sitting athletics directors might not feel comfortable about making a motivational speech to the visiting team before a game on his campus. The Skipper is, in many ways, a cut above.
So it was that Bertman strode into the Camelot Club, on the 21st floor of a downtown Baton Rouge building, where the Demons were treated to their pregame meal Tuesday afternoon before visiting LSU at venerable Alex Box Stadium.
Skip sees the big picture. It's not about who wins a mid-week game, but it's about impacting lives. If you've ever heard him speak, you're fortunate. He's one of the more outstanding motivational speakers in this era of college athletics. He didn't win those five national titles simply with great players and spot-on strategy, he found the extra edge that pushed his Tigers over the top again, and again, and again.
His talk mirrored tenets for the Demons put forth last fall by Davis, who has stressed a team-first approach. Bertman spoke "all about the game" and how it will test you because it's mostly about overcoming failure, said Davis.
He pointed out that Pete Rose is major league baseball's all-time hits king, but nobody made more outs than he did.
He said Rickey Henderson holds the stolen base record in the big leagues, but nobody was caught stealing more. Nolan Ryan is the all-time strikeout leader, but he also walked more hitters than any other pitcher in history.
Bertman asked the Demons what they were doing to make their team better, and said that approach would always provide them with positives. He asked a very fundamental question, and having heard him speak a few times, I'll paraphrase with a little Skip-ese:
"Fellas, each one of you has to ask yourself this -- if the locker room could talk, what would it say about you? Are you gonna be the guy who stands up for the fella going 0-for-the weekend? Or are you the guy who doesn't even notice when somebody else is struggling?"
What an experience for a room full of young baseball players, all of them dreaming big and hoping they were part of a team that could score a head-turning win over one of the great programs in college baseball.
There wasn't any immediate "Skip Magic" that propelled NSU to victory over LSU (something current LSU coach Paul Mainieri kiddingly expressed concern about to Davis during their very cordial pregame visit on the field), but you can bet his message will resonate around the Demon dugout and locker room, not only for the next few days but all season long. Well after they sack up their bats and hang up their gloves for good, I'm certain most of them will retain strong memories of those few minutes on Tuesday, March 25, when they ate like kings and were treated to a magical message.
It was, indeed, a little slice of Camelot.
Doug Ireland, SID
Pitching coach for NSU over the past seven years, he knows the territory around campus, around the Southland Conference and in Louisiana.
And, of course, he's firmly entrenched in college baseball circles.
None of which was required to realize that getting five-time national champion coach Skip Bertman to speak to his team Tuesday was a tremendous gift.
Most sitting athletics directors might not feel comfortable about making a motivational speech to the visiting team before a game on his campus. The Skipper is, in many ways, a cut above.
So it was that Bertman strode into the Camelot Club, on the 21st floor of a downtown Baton Rouge building, where the Demons were treated to their pregame meal Tuesday afternoon before visiting LSU at venerable Alex Box Stadium.
Skip sees the big picture. It's not about who wins a mid-week game, but it's about impacting lives. If you've ever heard him speak, you're fortunate. He's one of the more outstanding motivational speakers in this era of college athletics. He didn't win those five national titles simply with great players and spot-on strategy, he found the extra edge that pushed his Tigers over the top again, and again, and again.
His talk mirrored tenets for the Demons put forth last fall by Davis, who has stressed a team-first approach. Bertman spoke "all about the game" and how it will test you because it's mostly about overcoming failure, said Davis.
He pointed out that Pete Rose is major league baseball's all-time hits king, but nobody made more outs than he did.
He said Rickey Henderson holds the stolen base record in the big leagues, but nobody was caught stealing more. Nolan Ryan is the all-time strikeout leader, but he also walked more hitters than any other pitcher in history.
Bertman asked the Demons what they were doing to make their team better, and said that approach would always provide them with positives. He asked a very fundamental question, and having heard him speak a few times, I'll paraphrase with a little Skip-ese:
"Fellas, each one of you has to ask yourself this -- if the locker room could talk, what would it say about you? Are you gonna be the guy who stands up for the fella going 0-for-the weekend? Or are you the guy who doesn't even notice when somebody else is struggling?"
What an experience for a room full of young baseball players, all of them dreaming big and hoping they were part of a team that could score a head-turning win over one of the great programs in college baseball.
There wasn't any immediate "Skip Magic" that propelled NSU to victory over LSU (something current LSU coach Paul Mainieri kiddingly expressed concern about to Davis during their very cordial pregame visit on the field), but you can bet his message will resonate around the Demon dugout and locker room, not only for the next few days but all season long. Well after they sack up their bats and hang up their gloves for good, I'm certain most of them will retain strong memories of those few minutes on Tuesday, March 25, when they ate like kings and were treated to a magical message.
It was, indeed, a little slice of Camelot.
Doug Ireland, SID
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