CARDINALS

Cardinal baseball has eye on Omaha

Jeff Greer |

University of Louisville’s quest for a third College World Series trip since 2007 begins this week, but there was no sign that the raised stakes had affected the Cardinals as they prepared to leave for their conference tournament.

The newly crowned American Athletic Conference regular-season champions traveled on Monday to the AAC Tournament in Clearwater, Fla., with their first postseason game slated for 3 p.m. Thursday against Memphis.

U of L (43-13) finished the season on a 16-2 run and will be favored to win the AAC Tournament.

Yet the conference tournament feels like a dress rehearsal for a team certain to make the NCAA Tournament with or without the automatic bid.

Beyond the NCAA Tournament, U of L, now 12th in the Baseball America Top 25 and 20th in this week’s NCAA baseball RPI, has had its sights set on the CWS in Omaha, Neb., since the season began.

“You spend all season working and playing to build up your resume for the show,” star outfielder Jeff Gardner said. “This is it. This is the show.”

Gardner said that his team must play “good ball” to navigate the AAC Tournament, and that the competition will be good for them ahead of the coming NCAA Tournament.

The AAC Tournament’s Pool A consists of U of L, Rutgers, USF and Memphis. The Pool A winner plays the winner of Pool B, with UCF, Houston, Temple and UConn, for the tournament championship on Sunday.

To at least get through this week, the Cards may have to work their way through the AAC Tournament without one of their top two starting pitchers.

Junior righty Jared Ruxer’s status is uncertain because of a forearm ailment. Ruxer, who is 7-1 with a 2.27 earned-run average, hasn’t pitched in nine days.

In Ruxer’s place, Louisville turns to freshmen Josh Rogers, Jake Sparger and Drew Harrington, sophomore Anthony Kidston and junior Joe Filomeno.

Kidston pitched a seven-inning shutout in Louisville’s season finale against Cincinnati. Rogers gave up one run on four hits over eight innings in his last start, Saturday’s win over Cincinnati.

“A lot of guys are stepping up,” said Ruxer’s fellow ace, Kyle Funkhouser. “It seems like new guys step up every week. All the weight isn’t on one person.”

Louisville can still rely on Funkhouser to head the Cards’ rotation.

Funkhouser, a sophomore right-hander from Oak Forest, Ill., leads the AAC in wins and strikeouts and is second in the league in ERA among starting pitchers. He’s 11-2 with a 1.74 ERA.

“I think it’s pretty close to the best I ever have (pitched),” Funkhouser said. “I feel like there’s better to come.”

That would be welcome for a Louisville team hoping to reach its third College World Series since 2007, when coach Dan McDonnell took the Cardinals to Omaha in his first year at the helm.

Louisville clubbed its way to the 2007 CWS, scoring 77 runs in eight games before winning one and losing two in Omaha.

Six years later, U of L returned to college baseball’s biggest stage, this time less of a Cinderella story. Last year’s team still surprised Vanderbilt in a Super Regional upset, but the Cards had the pitching and the power to make a run, only to lose their first two games at the CWS.

The 2014 team looks like last year’s group. This week, Gardner said, is about playing “good baseball” and whittling this Cardinals squad into an Omaha-worthy team.

And they don’t want to stumble during the process.

“There are days where (Omaha) seems forever away and days when it seems close,” Gardner said. “We can add up all these days and build something.

“Otherwise, if you stay too focused on the mountain, you’ll trip on the molehill. Omaha is that mountain.”

Reach Jeff Greer at (502) 582-4044 and follow him on Twitter @jeffgreer_CJ.