MOBILE, Ala. – University of South Alabama baseball head coach Mark Calvi recently sat down with USAJaguars.com to recap the 2017 season.

Highlights from the second part of a two-part interview are below.

How do you feel the team handled the unusual schedule due to inclement weather at the Sun Belt Conference Tournament?
"They were unbelievable. We have curfew every night and we check, but this is a team that you wouldn't have to. Our guys were ready; they would wake up the next day ready to play the game and we'd get rained out. We knew we were going to have to play early in the morning, but it wasn't a team that you had to wake up at 6:30 in the morning for three or four days in a row just to get them ready. I knew they'd be ready. It was just a bunch of mature guys who wanted to win, and I had known for two months that everything they did was for the right reasons. I knew that they would show up and be ready to go. Whether we won or not, the effort, energy-level and the want to win would be there. If you have that in a team, the rest is just go out there and play the game. It could have rained four more days and we would have been as ready as we would have been had there been no rain."

Were you surprised with how the team won the SBC Tournament championship game considering some of the wins in similar fashion earlier in the season?
"It really wasn't a surprise to me. When (Ryan) Cleveland hit that three-run home run for them (Georgia Southern) to go ahead in the bottom of the eighth (inning), about five or 10 seconds passed and I heard two or three guys say, 'Okay, let's score three next inning.' I heard one guy say, 'You have to play us for 27 outs.' We're still on the field and down two runs with 3,000 people screaming, and literally within five to 10 seconds of him touching home plate I heard guys saying that. It wasn't like it was quiet and you could hear a pin drop; our guys were figuring out what we had to do to win the game. We still had to get them out three times in that inning, and credit Matt Peacock who got two quick outs then (Avery) Geyer came in. Then it was home runs by (Dylan) Hardy and (Eddie) Paparella, and we almost won it in the ninth (inning). Geyer went back out and did his job, we come back in and win the ballgame. Our guys didn't know how they were going to win it, but I'm telling you they knew they were going to win that ballgame."

Who were some of the individuals who stood out in their improvement from the beginning of the fall through the end of the season?
"This was a team that needed every one of its players. When they are not on our time, what matters most is what they do on their time. They were with each other and just kept working – Colton Thomas, Dylan Hardy, Wells Davis, Carter Perkins. How about Carter Perkins? He steps in during the most crucial time of year, and we don't miss a beat. That guy was unbelievable. Matt Peacock – always taking the ball. Thomas Huston with some what he did early in the year; there are so many MVPs on the team that you can't point to one guy."

How important was Carter Perkins' performance following Jared Barnes' injury?
"The game doesn't threaten him, he just stayed ready; that's who Carter Perkins is. He kept working and caught some, but probably not enough. I probably should have caught him more. He had a really bad game at Southeastern Louisiana, and that was kind of the turning point of our season. Carter never got down and kept working; he stayed ready. He stayed as close to game-ready as a kid could possibly stay, just through his work and work ethic. We didn't miss a beat. He went right in there and did his thing. He didn't need a week to get caught up, and we didn't have a week. He was phenomenal down the stretch."

What is the key to being solid defensively with guys playing multiple positions?
"It's them being comfortable and coached. (Assistant) Coach (Alan) Luckie does an unbelievable job with the infielders, and that's where most of the moving parts were. But it's by design. We try to recruit really good infielders, and when they get here we try to teach them pretty much every position on the field with the exception of maybe first base. Coach Luckie does an unbelievable job with the infielders, and they have a total buy-in to what he tells them. We just have some versatility, but it is a lot work on Coach Luckie's part on the front end as well as on the players really baring down and learning the different jobs and assignments. It takes a lot of time because there are a lot of things to go over, but that is time we have in the fall when we work on those things. You have to recruit and coach against your worst nightmare, and that is not being good enough on the infield or on the mound. It's by design that we move guys around. If you come out and watch us in the fall, we're moving guys all around the field. We're trying to make them a little bit uncomfortable at other positions so they can be more comfortable in the spring if we need it. And it's the same thing with the outfielders. (Assistant) Coach (Chris) Prothro does a great job with the outfielders as well."

What are your thoughts on the 2018 roster with the losses to the MLB Draft and graduation?
"I feel good. Coming in to the year last year, no one knew what Matt Peacock was going to do; not even Matt Peacock. He wasn't even sure he was going to play, and thank goodness he did. Where would we be without that kid? Ben Taylor, in the fall of 2014 heading into the 2015 season, no one had any idea what he would be – a starter or reliever. He didn't know and I didn't really know. It's just about having talented guys, and usually you figure it out. We have some good guys coming in. Tyler Carr was supposed to be our closer this year. That's what he did in junior college; he was in the top 10 nationally in saves for two straight years. He was supposed to be a closer for us, and he ended up being a Sunday starter for us and a good one. You just never really know. You have to let the season play out. You try and put guys in a position to where they can succeed, and ultimately put them in a position where they can help the team win. That's what it was this year. But we'll have Nick (DeSantis) back, and hopefully he is ready by game one and if not then hopefully by mid-season. We recruited some junior college guys and high school kids with good arms who will fill that out. If you have the right kids with the right makeup, then they step up. Look at a guy like Andy Arguelles. He beat Auburn, LSU, pitched great against Southern Miss – Arguelles pitched against, arguably, the toughest teams we played all year long. He faced the best offenses. So does he make a jump? I totally expect him to. Tyler Perez, JoJo Booker coming in as a freshman who was just drafted in the fifth round – I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we land him because he could really be a special pitcher here at South Alabama over the next few years. I'm looking forward to it. There are a lot of familiar faces back, guys who had a lot of success this year. So the thing is how you manage success. It's one thing to manage failure, but how do you manage success? How do you handle the attention you're getting, and how do you establish that team vision and chemistry? We lost some backbone guys of this program as seniors:  Cam Cummings, Matt Bolger, Randy Bell, Harrison Spruiell. Harrison had a fracture in his back. He was 89-92 in the fall and he was going to be one of our weekend starters or a closer, and he came back after Christmas and his back goes the first week. That's a guy who went from one of our main guys to where it would hurt him on the bus rides; his lower back was killing him. But Harrison gave everything he had for the program. Could he have gone out there and pitched an inning or two? Yeah, he could have pitched a little more. But you talk about selfless and other guys feeding off of that. We had some guys who played major roles in this program's success this year who didn't play or pitch every single day. It takes a village, and there is no doubt it took a village to get this team to where we needed it to be. It took everyone on board every single day. They wanted to win. It was all about winning and representing the University and themselves in the right way, and that's what they did."

Discuss all of the work the coaching staff put in over the year that helped lead to the team's success.
"There is a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff that goes in to putting the team on the field. There's just so much planning and recruiting, and just countless hours and times being told no. You keep recruiting and keep working, and try to get the right guys for this program. It's getting the right guys who are good enough and are the right type of person to fit this program, and it's just countless hours of planning and preparation. There are so many hours that go into the recruiting and being away from home, it's non-stop through the summer and into the fall and spring. (Assistant coach) Chris Prothro probably misses half of our games a year, because he is on the road looking at high school juniors and junior-college guys. Our guys, (assistant coach) Bob Keller and Prothro – it's countless hours of game and practice preparation, scouting reports, it never ends. And we have coaches who can't recruit. Andrew Carden, our Director of Operations, is phenomenal. He takes care of the organization and keeps the players moving in the right direction in the areas that they need to be with the off-the-field stuff. He is absolutely fantastic. And Alan (Luckie) helps me out a great deal with the on-the-field stuff. Having a guy help me with the position players like Alan does is phenomenal. It's a very unique situation. I don't have the 23-year-old volunteer assistant whose shoulder I have to look over. I have some older, responsible guys that I have some trust in and the players have some trust in; it's ideal for me because it frees me to recruit and do the things we need to do to be successful as a program. A lot of head coaches don't recruit, but I get out a lot and that's an advantage as well. Kids and parents want to see that the head coach knows who the kids coming in are. These guys allow me to do some things because I trust them and there is continuity within the program. We all have our hand in recruiting. Bob will direct some traffic when it comes to recruiting, and he has done a phenomenal job of identifying guys. Our guys understand their roles. We are going to make mistakes, we know how hard it is. There is just so much going on with so many games and so many kids that you can't see them all, you just have to make the best decisions you can and try to outwork people."

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