KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — One group of Tennessee alumni is cheering especially hard for the baseball team in the College World Series Final as they remember what it was like to win a national title.
The last UT championship team was the 2009 track and field Lady Volunteers. Although that was 15 years ago, WBIR spoke with former runners and coaches who remember exactly what that winning moment was like.
“When you actually get to that point, you know, it's almost surreal. It's like a dream,” former track team member Ellen Hurst described. “Having that experience of, you know, we're all here for the same purpose, and we're doing it together for each other. I think that's a life-changing experience for anyone.”
Hurst was a part of the University of Tennessee Track and Field team when they won the national championship in 2009.
“It's something that's almost undescribable being a part of, because there's nothing like it,” Hurst said. “I mean, it's so rare.”
Now Director of Operations for the university’s program, Hurst says there are a few key ingredients needed for a championship-winning team outside of the talent.
“The next thing you need is that winning mindset,” Hurst shared. “And I think Coach JJ Clark was really, really good at coaching us to be champions in our minds.”
Coach JJ Clark worked at UT for 14 years before moving to California to work for Stanford's Track and Field program. From his perspective, Coach Clark says the team’s camradie was key.
“You have to have the ability to listen, have a sharp eye of knowing when to say, what to do, what to do, not to talk too much, and listen,” Clark said. “They had a very good bond so that helped us be very good on the track. They ran for each other. They competed for each other.”
Phoebe Wright remembers running on the team well.
“We just had a fantastic, magical chemistry, talent of a women's roster,” Wright said.
Wright’s former teammate, Sarah Brown, agreed.
“I just remember, like, the team camaraderie, the excitement. Everyone was supporting each other no matter what,” Brown detailed. “There was always a talk on our team about paper champions. And no matter what, you could look at somebody's ability on a piece of paper and say, ‘Well, this is who should win, or this is how it should play out.’ But that's never how reality is. That's not how the world actually works, because there's so many more components about, you know, your heart that day, those aspects of the team just coming together. And when a group of people come together and they do have that dynamic going for them, it is amazing some of the things you can accomplish above and beyond what you might have ever thought was possible on a piece of paper.”
The title, and the team, is something Wright says she will always remember fondly.
“When you put on the Tennessee jersey, you're competing for more than just yourself. And there's something real special about that,” Wright remembered. “I knew it was special in the time, and then Coach Clark kept telling us it was special, but like it was once in a lifetime. Like nobody ever gets to feel that, like I feel sad for other people that don't get to feel the feeling of competing in a national championship.”
It’s a feeling former teammate Sarah Brown says she wants the baseball team to keep in mind, regardless of the game’s final score.
“A good amount of nerves and things like that are a healthy thing, but don't let any of the…don't let it get to you in a negative way,” Brown said. “Just really, just enjoy and experience the moment as you're in it.”
When it comes to Brown’s advice, it’s similar: “seize the moment.”
All those former Vols say, of course, they're cheering for the Big Orange.
“Tennessee and my time there was a special place for me, and it's always gonna it could, you know, it contributes to even who I am today, like the experiences I've had there, they definitely have carried through and contributed to just who I am,” Brown said. “So I'm always going to bleed orange and root for the Vols.”
Hurst tells us the University of Tennessee's athletics department has their own watch party tonight where she says the entire group will be cheering on Coach Vitello and his team.