MADISON TOWNSHIP, Ohio — The immediate returns were less than favorable, but Madison used last year’s spring trip to Tennessee as a springboard to a district championship.
Longtime coach Doug Rickert found the southern swing so advantageous, the Rams are back in the Volunteer State this week.
Beginning Monday, Madison will play four, high-profile Nashville-area teams in four days. The Rams face Brentwood Academy, Pope John Paull II, Battle Ground Academy and Nashville Christian before heading home Thursday.
“We are playing very good competition and they have been playing regular-season games down there since the middle of March,” Rickert said. “We are going to be somebody’s 10th or 11th game and it will be our first time on the field.”
The Rams were 1-3 in their four games in Tennessee last year, part of a woeful 2-7 start, before coming to life in the second half of the season. Madison won 16 of its final 22 games, sharing the Ohio Cardinal Conference championship with Lexington and advancing to the Division I Sweet 16 for the first time since 2002. The Rams fell to Toledo St. Francis 4-1 in the regional semifinals.
“Last year we kept telling the kids it wasn’t going to be easy,” Rickert said. “We were 1-3 in Tennessee last year, then we came back and struggled in our own tournament (the BW-3 Classic).”
Playing elite competition is nothing new at Madison. Rickert, the school’s athletic director, traditionally puts together the area’s toughest regular-season schedule.
“I still believe — and I’ve believed it since the day I became coach here — that playing that type of competition shows our kids where they are at as a baseball player, where we are at as a baseball team and how much better we need to get,” Rickert said. “They won’t see any better competition than what they are going to see down there.”
The Rams return a solid group from last year’s squad, including senior pitchers Michael Penney and Curtis French, senior first baseman and Wright State University signee Zane Harris and senior center fielder Dakota Gombosch. Sophomores Cal Rickert (the coach’s son) and Jaycob Stone were regulars in the Madison infield last spring.
The Rams dropped to Division II this year after spending the past four years in Division I. That doesn’t mean the competition will be any less formidable once the postseason begins. The 16-team sectional/district field includes defending district champ Bellevue as well as highly-regarded Lexington, Ontario, Shelby, Huron and Vermilion.
“It’s loaded, but that is why we schedule the games we do,” Rickert said. “We’re in Division II, but we are still playing a Division I schedule.
“The biggest question is will the competition freak our kids out? You hope it does the opposite. It worked last year for us and we’ve got to hope it works again.”
