Montclair State athletics photo

Grand Chute, Wisconsin - This win was a long time coming. Fifteen years to be exact. Montclair State University became the first team in 15 years to win the NCAA Division III Baseball Championship after losing its first game in the tournament. The Red Hawks won the title Tuesday by beating the University of St. Thomas 6-2 in the championship game at Fox Cities Stadium.

Montclair had to beat St. Thomas twice because the Tommies entered the day as the only unbeaten team. Montclair beat St. Thomas 13-3 in the opening game Tuesday. "It's very satisfying," Montclair State head coach Norm Schoenig said. "To come out of the loser's bracket is a real testament to these kids. "Once you eliminate that final destination and work at the job at hand, you get where you want to go."

• Game-by-game results
• Division III baseball championships record book

Montclair got a superlative pitching performance from sophomore Corey Hamman (8-2), who was named the tournament's Most Valuable Player. Hamman allowed seven hits and one earned run while going the distance. Hamman struck out five and didn't walk a batter. For the tournament, Hamman pitched 15 2-3 innings and allowed just eight hits and one earned run. "Against the level of competition we played ... to give up just one earned run, I can't even believe it," Hamman said. "When I went out on the mound, I didn't think about anything but hitting spots and throwing strikes."

Mike Honsa (10-4) went the distance and took the loss. "They just outplayed us. They've got better hitters," St. Thomas head coach Dennis Denning said of Montclair. "It's tough to take when your expectations were nice and high. They had more bullets than we did."

Montclair got on the board in the bottom of the second inning. Brian Ellerson started the rally when third baseman Jon Guion fielded his ground ball and made a wild throw. The bad throw allowed Ellerson to advance to second. Frank Longo followed with a high chopper over Guion's head and into left field, allowing Ellerson to score for a 1-0 lead.

The Red Hawks made it 5-0 in the third. Montclair strung together five consecutive hits, started by Craig Conway's single to center field. George Gallagher followed with a single to left field, and Ellerson's infield single loaded the bases. Longo then doubled over the head of right fielder Ryan Benson to score Conway and Gallagher to make it 3-0. Frank Francia then singled up the middle to score Ellerson and Benson to give Montclair a 5-0 lead.

"This is the best hitting team I've ever played for, one through nine," said Conway, adding the team's character was key to a run to the title through the loser's bracket. "That's the only way to sum it up. This team has a lot of heart. Our guys deserve a lot of credit. They never got down. They never gave up."

St. Thomas cut the lead to 5-1 in the fifth with the help of a Montclair error. Steve Aronson's fly ball to center field to lead off the inning was dropped, allowing Aronson to advance to second. After a ground out, Benson singled past second baseman Dave Wurst to score Aronson.

Montclair got that run back in the sixth inning. Francia started the inning with a one-out single, and Marc Houser walked to put runners at first and second. After Jeff Schriber lined out, Wurst stroked a single to left field to score Francia and build the lead to 6-1. "I tip my hat to them," Honsa said. "They got hits when they needed them, when it counted."

The Tommies had a chance for a big inning in the eighth, but Hamman was able to escape serious damage. With one out, Matt Buzzell was hit by a pitch and Jake Mauer followed with a single to put runners at first and second. A wild pitch moved the runners to second and third, and Dan Novak followed with a ground out to score Buzzell to trim the lead to 6-2. Hamman then got Luke Sather to ground out to end the inning. The Tommies managed one hit in the ninth, but Montclair turned a 3-6-1 double play to end the game.