8A — Wednesday, April 15, 2015
Sports
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
From afar: Bastien’s success a family affair
By MATTHEW KIPNIS
Daily Sports Writer
Not once did Gary Bastien ask
his son to follow in his footsteps.
Gary didn’t hang up decathlon
trophies or jerseys from his days
at the U.S. Olympic trials around
the house. At no point did he brag
about stories from the glory days.
And he certainly never pushed
his son, Steven, to be an athlete,
run track or compete in the same
event he did.
It just happened that way.
Steven, a junior at Michigan,
didn’t start running to chase
his father’s records, and he was
always reminded that it wasn’t
something he had to do. He did
it because it was something he
loved to do.
“He loves the sport in a
different way than I do,” Gary
said. “He is able to really have
a perspective where this is fun
for him, where I used to wrap
my whole identity into my
performance.”
Despite two career paths that
feature almost identical skillsets,
personal records and techniques,
it has been the younger Bastien’s
ability to love what he does and
stay positive that has separated
him from his father and the rest
of the pack.
* * *
It was an ordinary day in
Saline, Michigan when Gary
Bastien realized that his son could
be a star athlete. He was washing
dishes as the neighborhood kids
were playing on the backyard
trampoline trying to dunk a Nerf
ball into a hoop.
As he looked out the window,
he could see the kids competing,
trying to nail the perfect dunk.
Soon, Gary looked up to see a
five-year-old Steven fly into the
air, do a front flip and dunk the
ball with ease. As the other kids
were jumping four feet away
from the hoop, according to
the elder Bastien, Steven was
jumping from 14 feet.
“I remember thinking, ‘I don’t
think I could have done that in
my prime,’ and he was five,” Gary
said. “It gets your attention as
someone who was an athlete like
I was.”
But Steven was just messing
around with his friends. As
always, he was just having fun.
* * *
When it came to track, Gary
was hesitant to push Steven in
the beginning. After the elder
Bastien graduated from Eastern
Michigan, he moved to Auburn,
Alabama and saw fathers who
came to every practice and stood
behind their sons’ shoulders,
telling them what to do. He didn’t
want to become a helicopter
father who forced his son to do
what he did.
“I always told him, ‘You don’t
have to do this,’ ” Gary said. “
‘Just because I did it doesn’t
mean you have to match me or
try to chase that. Do what you
want to do.’ He just had a lot of
natural inclination to want to do
this stuff.”
Steven had a variety of sports to
choose from — he played pickup
basketball
in
the
neighbors’
driveways and baseball with his
uncle, a Michigan State graduate
who played with former World
Series hero Kirk Gibson. But he
chose the same path and sport as
his father. He even competed in
the same event — the heptathlon.
“I definitely followed in his
footsteps, but it wasn’t that I
needed to do what Dad did,”
Bastien said. “It just happened.”
As Steven approached middle
school, he joined the Ann Arbor
track club. Like his days playing
in the backyard, it was mostly
recreational. Most days, the team
played capture the flag on the
inside of the track, which would
be its running workout for the
day.
Even in high school, it was
still just about the fun. As a
freshman, Steven was small
for his age — standing around
5-foot-1, weighing 95 pounds —
and his father had to warn him
that there was a chance he might
not grow any more. That didn’t
deter Steven, as he maintained
the belief that he could catch up
to the competition.
“My dad always told me, ‘You
will get faster one day. That’s
what happened to me and both
your uncles,’ ” Steven said. “I
just believed it. I always told my
friends that were faster than me,
‘I am going to be just as fast as
you,’ and they didn’t believe me.
But it ended up happening.”
Eventually Steven, like his
uncles and father, blossomed into
an elite athlete and came into
his own. As soon as he started
to hit his stride, he had to adjust
to a new high school coach — his
father accepted a job at Saline
High School after working as
a part-time coach at Eastern
Michigan.
“Had I been coaching at
Eastern,
I
wouldn’t
have
experienced that with him,”
Gary Bastien said. “That was just
a great time to be able to coach
your son.”
Added his son: “Sometimes
it was frustrating, because he
would tell me I wasn’t doing
something right. I would butt
heads with my dad sometimes,
but
overall
it
was
a
cool
experience.”
With his father’s help, Steven
was able to win Mr. Track and
Field for the state of Michigan
and set personal records in
nearly every event.
* * *
With college looming, Steven
decided he wanted to get away
from his hometown for the first
time. For the first two years of
his collegiate career, he attended
Samford University in Alabama.
Under coach Rod Tiffin, he
improved his long jump, but his
body quickly wore out.
“In that conference, I was
doing so much,” Steven said.
“My last outdoor season there,
I went into the meet banged up
from the rest of the season, but I
did 14 events in two days. It was
probably too much for my body to
do all that.”
Unlike when he was younger,
Steven wasn’t able to handle the
sheer quantity of events. The
fun he previously experienced
couldn’t surpass the exhaustion.
He
decided
he
wanted
to
specialize more and focus on
what he did best.
And in the back of his mind,
Michigan
had
always
been
calling. Having grown up just
outside Ann Arbor, that was
where he wanted to be.
When
former
Wolverines
runner Garrick Roemer called
Steven to convince him to
transfer, he was brought back
to the days of playing in the
backyard in Saline, where he and
Roemer were childhood friends.
Once Steven mentioned it to his
father and they looked into it, a
transfer made sense because of
Michigan coach Jerry Clayton’s
pedigree.
Steven envisioned the days of
backyard basketball and Saline
track and the fun days that lay
ahead, but when Steven finally
arrived on campus, his friend
was no longer here. As Steven
was taking his finals at the end
of last year, Roemer passed away.
Still, Clayton convinced him to
stay.
“He is one of the best coaches
in the world,” Gary said. “I know
that because I threw against him
when I coached at Eastern, but
what Steven and I didn’t know
is that he is not just a throwing
coach.
Steven
will
call
me
constantly and say, ‘You know
what Coach Clayton told me
about the high jump?’ and I will
hang up the phone and I start
walking through what he said,
going, ‘You know, that makes
sense, I didn’t know that.’ ”
And as helpful as Clayton’s
wisdom has been on Steven’s
running, he has been able to use
it to cope with Roemer’s death as
well.
“In order to be a decathlete,
it’s just a different personality
in order to be successful, and he
seems to have that,” Clayton said.
“You have to have that ability
that when you do one event, and
if things don’t go well you have to
forget it and go to the next event,
and he has that capacity.”
* * *
Since coming to Michigan,
even despite the tremendous grief
of dealing with a friend’s death,
Bastien has competed like he did
when he was a kid — carefree.
Clayton has allowed him to focus
on being a decathlete through
more individual treatment and
day-to-day instruction.
After a disappointing run at the
Big Ten Indoor Championships
this winter, Bastien came into
the NCAA Championships with
a different mindset. Before the
race, he was nervous, but this
time he decided to go in with the
mentality to have fun, put it all on
the line and take a few risks.
It paid off, as Bastien set the
program record for most points
in a heptathlon twice and became
Michigan’s first All-American in
the event.
With
Bastien
comfortably
under Clayton’s wing, the father
who never wanted to push his son
can finally take a step back. Gary
Bastien watched his son become
an All-American the same way he
saw him dunk that basketball all
those years ago — from afar.
Wolverines fall to MSU in Detroit
By ISAIAH ZEAVIN-MOSS
Daily Sports Writer
DETROIT — The Michigan
baseball team was unable to
continue its streak of success on
Tuesday night, falling to Michi-
gan State, 4-2, in a close contest at
Comerica Park.
The Wol-
verines (6-6
Big
Ten,
21-15 over-
all) had won nine of their previ-
ous 11 games entering Tuesday,
which presented Michigan with
an opportunity to continue its
rise in the Big Ten standings and
to keep the season’s momentum
alive.
On the mound for the Wol-
verines was junior left-hander
Evan Hill, who had pitched just
5.1 innings all season. He was
looking to use Tuesday night’s
game as another step on the road
back to reclaiming his role in the
weekend rotation, where he was
regularly featured last season.
But Hill was rusty. Through his
five innings of work, Hill allowed
seven hits and three earned runs
while striking out two.
“You can’t make mistakes to
good hitters,” Hill said. “When
you do, they make you pay. But,
in general, I think my stuff is
close to being where it was last
year.”
Michigan coach Erik Bakich,
though, did not think Hill’s per-
formance was the reason for his
team’s defeat. Instead, he praised
the junior pitcher for his off-the-
field contributions.
“I thought he pitched well
enough for us to win,” Bakich
said. “And it’s great to have him
back, not only because he’s a great
pitcher, but because of his leader-
ship, experience and physical tal-
ent. It’s a big lift for our team.”
In the fourth inning, Michigan
State (4-5, 19-15) broke open the
scoring, as shortstop Ryan Rich-
ardson hit a two-out RBI single.
But in just the next frame, the
Wolverines
responded.
After
senior catcher Kendall Patrick
was hit by a pitch and junior sec-
ond baseman Jacob Cronenworth
singled to right, the Wolverines
were set up to do damage. Senior
centerfielder
Jackson
Glines
bunted both runners over, which
brought up junior third baseman
Travis Maezes.
Maezes, who is still not fully
healthy — a strained oblique
kept him out until April 1 — did
not disappoint. He knocked a
two-run single to right field, and
Michigan led, 2-1.
The rally came to an abrupt
end, though, when Maezes was
thrown out at home trying to tag
up on a flyout by junior left fielder
Cody Bruder for the second out of
the inning. The Wolverines did
not score for the rest of the game.
That ended up being a crucial
turning point in a game where
scoring opportunities were hard
to come by. Michigan State did
not let Michigan forget it.
“I was taking a chance, I want-
ed to be aggressive,” Maezes said.
“I tagged up; it didn’t work out.
They made a good catch, a good
throw, a good tag. I was looking
to take advantage of an opportu-
nity. If he catches it, a two-out hit
is a lot to ask.”
Added Bakich: “We had a guy
with speed at third — you try to
press the situation a little bit. The
catcher made a nice pick on the
short hop, and he made a nice tag.
If that situation comes up again,
we’re going to do the same thing,
because that’s an opportunity to
score.”
In the bottom of the fifth, the
Spartans recaptured the lead.
After getting a strike out with
runners on second and third, Hill
was one out away from escaping
the jam. But first baseman Ryan
Krill lined a double to right field
that cleared the bases, and Michi-
gan State was up, 3-2.
In the seventh inning, Maezes
came up to the plate with runners
on first and third and only one
out, and the Wolverines looked
poised to strike back. But Maezes
grounded into an inning-ending
double play.
“We stranded too many run-
ners on base tonight,” Bakich
said. “But sometimes it’s just luck.
You can hit the hardest ball of
your life and somebody catches it,
or you can get jammed and it falls
in for a hit.”
Freshman right-hander Bryan
Pall came in to pitch in the eighth
inning. He surrendered a leadoff
ground-rule double to third base-
man Mark Weist, who advanced
to third on a sacrifice fly. Weist
scored on a wild pitch, giving
Michigan State a 4-2 lead.
In the ninth inning, the Wol-
verines went down in order.
After stranding nine runners
on base, it was a game of missed
opportunities for Michigan.
MICHIGAN
MSU
2
3
JAMES COLLER/Daily
Evan Hill allowed seven hits and three earned runs in five innings pitched.
Comerica a field
of dreams for ‘M’
By DANNY VARGOVICK
Daily Sports Writer
DETROIT — For a day, it was
a field of dreams.
The MLB Opening Day logo
on the grass was slightly faded,
and the ivy on the fountain
beyond the centerfield fence
was still brown from the
winter, but Comerica Park was
a fantastic setting for a weekday
game between in-state rivals
Michigan
and Michigan
State.
Both
teams
have
a
number
of
players
who
hail
from Detroit
suburbs and
grew
up
rooting
for
the Tigers. It
was an opportunity for these
players to play on the same
field Miguel Cabrera and David
Price took for Opening Day
eight days earlier. It was a night
to remember for these college
players who, statistically, are
unlikely to ever take the field
for an MLB Opening Day
themselves.
The game was scheduled at
a neutral site because, for the
second straight year, the two
teams weren’t scheduled to
play each other in conference
play. Both head coaches said
that it was a priority to play
their in-state rivals in the
non-conference
season,
but
they struggled to agree on a
location.
Comerica Park made sense
as a compromise for the single-
game showdown.
For
the
underclassman
Wolverines, it was their first
college game at a major league
park and first college game
against the Spartans.
Some of the older players
on the team have had a little
more
experience
in
major
league parks. Two years ago,
the team played Northwestern
at Wrigley Field, home of the
Chicago Cubs; Seton Hall at Citi
Field, home of the New York
Mets; and multiple teams in the
Big Ten Tournament at Target
Field, home of the Minnesota
Twins.
Comerica is one of the bigger
venues in the major leagues,
and it is substantially larger
than the Wilpon Complex in
Ann Arbor, providing different
dimensions for
hitters to deal
with.
The fence at
Wilpon is 312
feet down the
left field line,
320 feet down
the right field
line and 395
feet to center.
Comerica
is
345 feet to left,
330 feet to right and 420 feet to
center.
Centerfield at Comerica is
notorious for swallowing all
but the longest Miguel Cabrera
bombs to center and right-
center.
“That’s the goal — to hit
line drives,” said junior third
baseman Travis Maezes. “We
as a team today hit too many fly
balls. Growing up here, you see
that it’s not an offensive park, so
those are routine fly balls that
everyone can catch.”
Junior left-hander Evan Hill
also said that he tried to pitch
to contact with the spacious
outfield behind him.
The seats weren’t filled like
they were for Opening Day
last week, but the game still
drew a substantial number of
fans from both sides. It offered
fans from the Detroit area an
easier opportunity to reach the
game than if it had been in East
Lansing or Ann Arbor.
“It’s a dream for all of these
guys to play at this level on a
daily basis, and you get a taste
of it,” said Michigan State coach
Jake Boss.
BASEBALL
“It’s a dream for
all these guys to
play at this level
on a daily basis.”
AMANDA ALLEN/Daily
Steven Bastien became Michigan’s first All-American in the heptathlon in this year’s NCAA Championships.