Difficult job lies ahead

Recently hired Terrapin baseball coach Erik Bakich has so much confidence in his ability to turn around what's long been a stumbling and bumbling program that he can sell even the most cynical observers on his chances.

And with the rebuilding project Bakich will face when he arrives in College Park, that seemingly limitless enthusiasm might be the only way the 31-year-old former Vanderbilt assistant will succeed.

The Terps were 10-20 in the ACC last season, missing the top-eight team cutoff to qualify for the conference tournament yet again, as they have every year since the league expanded to 12 teams for the 2006 season.

They were next to last in the conference in both team ERA and batting average in 2009 and will actually lose a number of quality senior contributors for 2010. A 21-5 loss in March to Florida State meant former Terp coach Terry Rupp finished his nine-year tenure here winless - 0-27 to be exact - against the Seminoles.

Even the team's facilities don't meet the lofty standards shared by many of the ACC's elite. In February and March home games, the brisk, swirling wind around the relatively tiny ballpark regularly makes Shipley Field feel more like a hockey rink. The baseball coaches' offices are located in a trailer beyond the left field wall.

The team shares locker room space with a variety of other field sports in the Varsity Team House right next to that structure, an environment vastly different from the cozy clubhouses conference rivals such as Virginia, Georgia Tech and Clemson enjoy on their way to consistent appearances in the NCAA Regionals and sometimes beyond.

That's the situation Bakich willingly and energetically accepted last week, when he was officially named head coach. And if that isn't crazy enough, he said the dilapidated state of the program actually attracted him to the job.

"It persuaded me because it reminds me a lot of Vanderbilt," said Bakich, referring to the rebuilding effort he and head coach Tim Corbin produced in Nashville. "Everybody wants to be a part of a turnaround, and this is an opportunity where we can build Maryland baseball, build a winning tradition. There's no doubt in my mind that we can compete. I'm excited to set the alarm clock at night and wake up in the morning to get going."

That's all well and good, but any newly hired coach is going to declare success possible and hint at bigger things to come in the beginning of his or her tenure.

But why did I get the sense Bakich might back up his words when I called him Tuesday? He happened to be doing what his track record suggests he does best - recruiting. In fact, Bakich, who put together top-25 ranked recruiting classes in each of his seven years at Vanderbilt, has been on the trail so much in the past week that he has yet to move into his office.

Call his listed number on the Athletics Department directory and you'll get an outdated voice mail message left by Rupp, guiding you to associate head coach Jim Farr with any questions. (Bakich said last week he wouldn't retain Farr.)

So there might at long last be hope for this woeful program.

Right now, Bakich does have at his disposal an 11.7 scholarship allotment - the maximum allowed by NCAA standards. But he may have to work to keep it. In a mailer sent out Monday, the Terrapin Club asked contributors for scholarship support specifically for the baseball program as part of its "Fear The Turtle II" campaign.

If nothing else, Bakich can draw inspiration from some of his new big-name coworkers, even if their offices are a little more cushier.

Sasho Cirovski, Brenda Frese, Ralph Friedgen and Gary Williams all took over programs badly in need of a makeover. Combined, they've got four national championships and six ACC championships.

Bakich, for his part, said he has no timelines or long-term goals for the project ahead of him. He wants to start winning now.

"I would never approach anything like that," Bakich said. "I'm not looking to have an extended plan. We're going to instill a new culture, a new mindset. And there's good talent on that team. We're looking to get to the ACC Tournament this season."

But even if Bakich can inject some instant success into the baseball operation, it's going to take something special to make Terrapin baseball important and more than just something students show up at for two innings while on their way back from class on weekday afternoons.

It's going to take relentless ambition and commitment, the kind capable of weathering the crippling series losses and inevitable growing pains of the next couple seasons.

Does Bakich have those things?

He has me convinced, and it only took him one conversation.

akrautdbk@gmail.com