It was an absolute shock to all college baseball fans around the world when the Miami Hurricanes didn’t make the tournament last season. For a mind-boggling 44 years, they have been like part of the furniture in the competition and it just seemed weird without them there. Now, Jim Morris is preparing to regain his team’s place in the NCAA, as he gets ready to start his final season as head coach before retiring. It seems highly unlikely that Miami would miss two seasons in a row after such a dominant history within college baseball, and the players will want to pull together for Morris’ last hurrah.
Morris first started in Miami back in 1994 when the Hurricanes already had a successful program. He set a college record when he guided the team to the College World Series in each of his first six years at the helm. The icing on the cake was the sixth year of that incredible run when he won the national championship in 1999 for the first time with the team. In 2001, he took them back to the World Series and received his second championship with the Hurricanes. Since his arrival, Morris’ amazing coaching ability has seen Florida make the tournament for 23 straight years under his leadership. That was until last year anyway.
It’s truly incredible what Morris has achieved at Miami and he will surely go down in the history books as one of the greatest college coaches of all time. He will have coached the Canes for a staggering 25 years at the end of his tenure, which is a remarkable accomplishment for anyone involved in the sport. In comparison, the longest-serving coach in the MLB is currently Mike Scioscia from the Los Angeles Angels, who has been in charge since 2000. Certainly a decent stint in charge but nowhere near what Morris has achieved at Miami. Scioscia will be hoping to snare himself a championship before he retires but may have to wait another year, with the Angels looking like a long shot at +1600 according to MLB betting on bet365.
Miami were unlucky not to make it through last season after running into a fired up North Carolina in the ACC Tournament. The ACC will once again be full of competitive opponents but the team should be able to bounce back and send off their leader in the fashion he deserves.
The star coach was obviously disappointed last year not to make the postseason and he has vowed to Hurricanes fans that he will restore their place back in the NCAA. While speaking at a press conference, he said that he had already met with the coaching staff and addressed the issue with his colleagues. He also mentioned that his main goal next year is to make it to Omaha as he feels that, even though playing baseball is great, winning makes it all that much better.
One of the areas that Miami will have to improve in if they want to get back to their usual high standard is their offense. Luckily, big slugger Romy Gonzalez will be returning and should offer some extra firepower for the side.
After such an outstanding career in the sport, you can only hope that the Hurricanes can muster up something special and send off coach Morris in style. He will be greatly missed by the Miami supporters and will go down as one of the greatest college baseball coaches of all time.
