Shaban and Hokies look toward future with high hopes

BLACKSBURG Ronnie Shaban's freshman season as a Virginia Tech baseball player was exactly one month old March 20 when he stepped to the plate against Georgia Tech pitcher Deck McGuire. Shaban, a Cosby High graduate, was familiar with McGuire, a sophomore who played at Deep Run and would end up becoming this season's ACC pitcher of the year.

Shaban arrived at Tech confident that he could play in the ACC, and he was proving himself during the season's first month, when he hit .324. But he hadn't felt comfortable at the plate lately. He had just five hits in his past 20 at-bats before this Friday game against the Yellow Jackets and their ace right-hander.

Shaban dug in from the left side against McGuire and blooped a two-strike double down the left-field line -- a moment he recalls now, a week after the Hokies' season ended, as the turning point in a successful first year.

"I guess things are starting to go my way," Shaban thought as the double hit the ground.

The same seems to be true for the Hokies, who finished their third season under coach Pete Hughes with a 32-21 record -- their highest winning percentage (.604) since 1999. Though they missed the ACC tournament for the fourth consecutive season, their 12-17 conference record was their best since they joined the league in 2005. In their previous three seasons, they were 17-72 in the ACC.

Hughes is certain that Tech next season will make the NCAA tournament and contend for an ACC championship. His optimism stems from promising players such as Shaban, who batted .326, drove in 38 runs and became the everyday shortstop when senior Ty Hohman and sophomore Tony Balisteri got hurt.

Hughes will return every significant player on his roster besides Hohman; Klint Reed, the left fielder and lead-off hitter; and pitcher Rhett Ballard, who led Tech with 15 starts and 80 innings pitched.

Though Hughes believed Shaban was ready to contribute in his first season, "It's always a flip of a coin with a freshman," he said. Then he watched Shaban -- who missed fall workouts because of tendinitis in his right (throwing) triceps -- begin the season at first base, transition to short after the injuries and play well enough to remain there once Hohman and Balisteri healed.

"I think he's gonna be one of the better players in the league here in the next couple years," Hughes said.

Shaban, a natural shortstop, might slide over to third next season because the Hokies will have Tim Smalling, who was the starting shortstop at Arkansas as a freshman and sophomore. The move wouldn't be entirely foreign to Shaban, who started 10 games at third this season.

Shaban will spend his offseason playing for the Petersburg Generals in the Coastal Plain League, a wood-bat summer league for college players. Hughes wants Shaban to improve not only handling left-handed pitchers but also handling his emotions.

Hughes loves Shaban's competitive edge and wishes more of his players had it. But too often this season Shaban reacted to striking out (he ranked second on the team with 42) by throwing his helmet or sulking. Instead of fuming, Hughes told Shaban to use that time to consider what went wrong at the plate.

"He'll let some bad at-bats sink in there for a while," Hughes said. "We don't have time for that."

Now that Shaban has weathered the ups and downs of his freshman year, he feels ready to help the Hokies reach the next level they desperately crave.

"The expectations aren't [just] gonna be to have a winning record anymore," Shaban said. "The expectations are gonna be to get into the ACC tournament and the national tournament."

Contact Darryl Slater at (804) 649-6026 or .