Coastal Carolina Shocks College Baseball World, Wins School's First Title In Any Sport

Coastal Carolina did it! The Chanticleers (yeah, that’s their nickname) topped Arizona 4-3 on Thursday to cap off a crazy run to a College World Series title. They wound up going 6-0 in elimination games and knocked off a host of big-name programs to claim their school’s first national title in any sport.

Our own Michael Shamburger knew they had a chance at a title weeks ago:

But still, it’s a school with an enrollment of 10,263 located in Conway, South Carolina that boasts almost no legacy of athletic greatness. The Chanticleers had never even reached the College World Series before and faced an Arizona program that had been there a whopping 16 times and won four titles.

Once they reached Omaha, the Chanticleers opened the World Series by beating top-seeded Florida 2-1, then lost to TCU 6-1 in the second round. But they bounced back by beating fifth-seeded Texas Tech 7-5, and getting revenge on TCU with 4-1 and 7-5 wins. They then dropped the opener of the best-of-three title series with Arizona 3-0. But, as they had done all tournament long, the Chants fought back and won the next two games 5-4 and 4-3 to take home the title.

Andrew Beckwith got the win in the final game of the championship series, finishing a remarkable season with a 15-1 record and 1.85 ERA. Beckwith was named the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player.

Coastal Carolina’s run was even impressive before they got to Omaha. In the Raleigh Regional, they topped host N.C. State, then went to the Baton Rouge Super Regional and swept LSU with 11-8 and 4-3 wins.

So no, the Chanticleers were not some wildly over-matched David besting a Goliath. But it was still a great run for a small school not known for athletic endeavors.