Cut the grass and dust off the infield. It’s time for America’s pastime at Indiana Wesleyan University. The Wildcat baseball and softball teams have been hard at work gearing up for the first pitch of the season tomorrow, each with the same thing to prove. That they belong in their respective conference tournament conversation.

“I’d rather have a team that would fight and die for each other than a team who is super-talented but the cohesion isn’t there,” said Steve Babinski, IWU’s first-year softball coach.

Lucky for him, a fight-and-die team is exactly what he thinks he has.

“I don’t say that to say that this team isn’t talented at all,” Babinski said. “But one of our big strengths is they’re playing for each other.”

These Wildcats are buying into that line of thinking too, as the team prepares for a new season that looks to be an improvement from last year.

“Anytime you have a team that clicks well, and you don’t really have any infighting or anybody that doesn’t really fit, then that’s the makings of a great team,” said center fielder Tamara Davis (sr). “I feel like we’ve accomplished that a lot in the fall and with this semester too.”

2011 was a rough year for IWU softball, in addition to being the last for Sue Bowman, the only coach in program history. After two consecutive 30-win seasons, the Wildcats tripped out of the gate and could never fully recover, partially due to key season-ending injuries in the first week of the season. The end result was a mediocre 22-21 finish and a first-day exit from the MCC Tournament.

But instead of calling 2012 a rebuilding year, IWU is trying to learn as much from last spring’s defeats as possible.

“That’s the one thing I will take away from last season is the closeness of the girls and how those relationships formed through the struggles we had to face as a team,” Davis said.

For Babinski, in his first season with the team, learning means trying new things and shaping a new look for the Wildcats.

“I’ve thrown a lot of curveballs at them, stuff they’ve never been asked to do before and they’ve been able to respond really well,” Babinski said. “We’re a completely different team today than we were in September. I’ve seen individual improvement across the board, and with that, the overall team is better.”

The return from injury of infielder Kristina Ross (so) and outfielder Kelsey Decker (sr) will also make the team better this season. With more pieces in the puzzle, IWU looks to return to its 30-win form and impress in the MCC Tournament.

Coach Babinski said he expects his team to rise above expectations, despite the Wildcats being picked in the polls to finish the regular season fourth in the MCC, a slot ahead of last year’s result.

“Even with that I think we’re going to surprise a lot of people,” he said.

The faster you run, the higher you fly. This theory behind pole-vaulting is one the entire Indiana Wesleyan University indoor track and field team used during the Taylor Invitational on Saturday, Feb. 4, at the Trojans’ field house to propel them to victory.

“The Taylor meet was a recovery weekend, so we left a lot of our team at home,” said coach John Foss. “But those who went made a strong showing.”

Three of those Wildcat athletes also vaulted over high standards at the meet, qualifying for the NAIA National Championship with their marks.

These athletes were Kyle Abney (jr), who threw past 33 competitors to win the men’s shot put with a throw of nearly 17 meters; Allix Miller (fr), who leaped 5.45 meters in the long jump; and Victoria Lee (sr), who trumped the 15.22-meter qualifying mark with a throw of 16.7 meters.

Miller and Abney each earned MCC Field Athlete of the Week honors for their performances.

“I am very pleased with our progress so far,” said Foss. “We continue to improve and get ready for the NCCAA championships at Cedarville.”

The team is sprinting toward the end of its indoor seasons with high hopes.

“Guys are expected to win, and the girls are close,” said pole-vaulter Courtni Fryer (fr). Bethel, she added, is expected to be the main competition for both the men’s and women’s teams.

Abney spoke on the future prospects of the track and field team.

“Things look good. Our [team] numbers are up, and there are a lot of young freshmen doing well overall,” said Abney.

The Wildcats will be home next weekend for the Wildcat Invitational Saturday, Feb. 11, at 11 a.m. in the Troyer Fieldhouse. After that, the Wildcats can look forward to the NCCAA championships Feb. 18 in Ohio and the outdoor track season in March.

He thinks he might have been 5-foot-10 since the day he was born. He grew up a self-diagnosed baseball knucklehead who eventually married an artist who doesn’t have one athletic bone in her body. To top it off, he fluently speaks a language he calls “ghetto.”

Steve Babinski is also the new Indiana Wesleyan University softball coach – the first one in more 24 years.

IWU Athletic Director Mark DeMichael hired Steve Babinski after longtime softball coach Sue Bowman retired from athletics in May of 2011. DeMichael said Babinski stood out above the other applicants because of his heart for sports as a ministry and his history of success.

Babinski played baseball for most of his life and was voted Grace College’s Athlete of the Year. He was a player on the team for four years and a paid assistant his fifth year.

Babinski worked as a paid assistant at Grace for one season, then moved on as an assistant coach at Bowling Green State University. From there, he was hired as head coach for the MidAmerica Nazarene ladies softball team, the Pioneers.

He now lives in Marion with his wife Rachel and their four children, Corianna, Alizzia, Benjamin and Emi to kick off his first season with IWU softball.

During his years with the Pioneers, he received two notable coaching awards. Babinski was named Heart of America Athletic Conference Coach of the Year and NAIA Region 5 Coach of the Year in 2006. Four years later, the National Fastpitch Coaches Association named him Midwest Region Coach of the Year.

DeMichael said he has confidence in Babinski’s ability to help athletes hit their potential, the way he did when he helped transform the Pioneers from mediocre to NAIA qualifiers—the first time in the history of the program.

Kelsey Decker (sr) is one of the Wildcats’ leaders and has been impressed with “coach Babs” and his mind for the game.

“His knowledge of the sport is better than anyone that I’ve ever played for – or even against,” Decker said.

Babinski is taking over a program that Bowman created in 1987 and was the coach of since its inception.

He laughs when people ask him what it’s like to follow a woman with such a big legacy.

“It’s not about filling shoes; it’s a relay,” Babinski said. “Sue passed the baton to me, and I’ll pass it on to whoever’s next.”

How’s he feeling about his first season?

That’s another question that makes him laugh.

“I know a lot of people are wanting to know wins and losses, but that’s not who I am,” Babinski said. “Basically, what I’ve seen is my girls get better every day. From day one to right now, everyone on our team is better. On the field, off the field, in the classroom: as people. So it’s already been a successful season.”

Julie Wagner graduated from Indiana Wesleyan University with a Master’s degree in business management in 2006. Six years later, she finds herself back at her old stomping grounds, not chasing a doctorate, but a dream.

The Wildcats’ athletic department hired Wagner to be the women’s golf program’s first head coach in its history, marking the beginning of the 16th intercollegiate sport at IWU. Athletic Director Mark DeMichael said it was Wagner’s love of every aspect of golf that made her the obvious choice for the job.

“It was really her combination of a passion for golf and her passion for teaching golf and having a relationship, you can see the excitement when she talked about it,” DeMichael said. “It was very obvious that her whole energy level excitement level, passion level was at another notch above all our other candidates.”

That enthusiasm in Wagner is evident. Although she is stepping into new territory, she says that she’s eager to learn.

“I think the most exciting part of starting this program is being able to try to pick and come up with some matches that the ladies will be able to play in,” Wagner said. “The recruiting part of it is very exciting and very challenging as well. It’s a whole new process for me to learn and to figure out.”

Golf was a late-blooming hobby for Wagner, who hadn’t even tried the game until she was in her 20s, when her eventual husband Paul introduced her to the fairway. The hobby turned into a successful endeavor, as Wagner has won six tournaments, including two Wildcat Creek Golf Course Invitationals.

Wagner is also a PGA certified golf instructor at Wildcat Creek in Kokomo, Ind., a credential that IWU men’s golf coach Steve Evans said will help the transition to coaching.

“She has gone through the school and has taught many lessons in golf, and I think that’s one of the most important qualities of a college coach,” Evans said. “To be able to recognize swing faults and be able to fix them with some drills and allow the players to play at their best.”

Despite her ability and enthusiasm, even Wagner and DeMichael have modest expectations for the women’s golf team, at least in its first season this fall.

“Goals are really hard to set right now because I don’t have a team yet, and we don’t know what caliber of players I’m going to get,” Wagner said. “But I think for a young team like we’re obviously going to have, I’m going to be really happy when we go and play tournaments if we can finish somewhere in the middle of the tournament.”

“You have to be careful what goals you set for yourself,” DeMichael said. “If you say our goal is, in the first year, to go to the NAIA National Tournament, not to say that’s impossible, but that’s a little unrealistic. The problem is if you set your goals like that, then you run the risk of not taking your time and building a solid foundation in the program.”

DeMichael is sure that Wagner is the right person for the job, and the future looks bright for the program without a past.

“The key at this point, in starting a new team, is you have to build a solid foundation,” DeMichael said. “I have every confidence that she will be able to do that and make this a successful program for years to come.”