After missing out on the playoffs a year ago, Tri-County Academy needed new blood injected into its baseball team.
It needed new leadership, new confidence and a new identity.
So, Tri-County raided the junior college ranks and came up with Bubba Frichter, a long-time assistant that was salivating at the opportunity to take over a program.
In only his first year as the Rebels’ head man, Frichter led his team to an unlikely state title.
It all began in the summer, where Frichter beat into his kids that to be the best, they had to believe they were the best.
“Any coach is going to expect his team to be successful,” Frichter said. “I told them every night when they went to bed to tell themselves they’re the best player in Mississippi on the best team in Mississippi. When they woke up in the morning, I wanted them to do the same. They bought into that.”
Heading into the 2016 season, the Rebels were in a little bit of uncharted territory.
For once, the expectations were not high.
And for a while, it seemed as if things were not going to change.
“It wasn’t really a surprise because I’ve seen teams turn around, but people around here didn’t seem to be expecting a whole lot because this same team didn’t make the playoffs last year,” Frichter said. “We started off with an 0-4 record. Before our district games started, we had a 5-8 record.”
But something happened when the Rebels reached the district games.
The cultural shift that Frichter had been trying to implement took hold.
“Once we started district until our state title, we finished 14-3,” Frichter said. “We did a pretty big turnaround at the right time.”
The playoffs were no cake walk, however, as rival Canton Academy loomed in the semifinals.
The Panthers took game one of the series and left Tri-County on the brink of elimination.
It was then that Frichter invoked another unlikely title winner.
“When Canton beat us in the first game 10-2, our guys started thinking maybe it was the end of the road,” Frichter said. “We had a long talk about battling back, and one of the things I reflected to was the 2004 America League Championship Series when the Yankees were up 3-0 on the Red Sox. The Red Sox came back and won four in a row. It gave them a little hope. They came out and went pitch by pitch and competed. It opened up a lot of eyes when we beat Canton twice there.”
In the state finals against Wayne Academy, Tri-County cruised, much like the aforementioned Red Sox did once they disposed of the Yankees.
TCA swept WA by scores of 13-3 and 13-0, respectively, to earn the title.
The Rebels relied on pitching much of the year to get them through games.
Frichter’s rotation was led by a trio of talented seniors.
“We worked and patched together some pitching,” Frichter said. “It was one of our stronger suits in the end. We had Mitchell Broadwater, Peyton Stewart and Wes Neely. Those were our main three guys, and they were all seniors. We also had some younger guys fill some holes.”
While he had some seniors with talent, they had some work to do.
Before they could succeed, they had to learn to pitch.
“They had pitched a lot, but we worked with them on some mechanic stuff,” Frichter said. “We got that straightened out. We developed some arm strength. They learned how to throw strikes and pitch. That was the main thing. They learned how to pitch instead of just throw.”
On the offensive side, Frichter relied on an unlikely duo: a sophomore and a senior that nearly did not even play.
“At the top of the order, we had senior Jake Jones and Garrett Harmon, who was a sophomore,” Frichter said. “Jake hadn’t played baseball in two years, and it was kind of a last minute decision for him on whether or not he even wanted to play. We’re glad he decided to come out because he hit over .400 for us. Harmon hit right at .400, and those guys did a really good job for us.”
The Rebels finished their state championship-winning season with a 19-11 record.
