GUILFORD HS BASEBALL COACH NICK MERULLO

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
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seven one. All right, that'ssports at nine sixty am ninety six point
nine FM w E l I andwe mentioned one of the baseball championships.

(02:17):
He's gotta wait all day. They'llbe putting more steps on in his house
allway. May walk down the street, up to down the street, up
to the street through the house.How much how many miles of this guy
cover? Because you know what,he's the very last championship. I mean
says, oh, come on,why couldn't I be like Adam killing with

(02:38):
They played last night, they won, They're all done. Now I have
to wait till tonight. And heis the head baseball coach at Guildford.
His name is Nick Marullo. Andtonight Guilford Brookfield that's the Bobcats, Bobcats
and Grizzlies for the l Championship atPalmerfield. I said, good morning to
you, Nick Marulo. How youdoing, buddy? Hey, I'm good.

(03:00):
How are you doing? I meanI've been given up all night.
You've been walking going out God play? Yeah, you got right, you
got that right. I was certainlyle envious of the of the Friday night
game getting over with after that hour, after that hour rain delay. I
don't I don't know about that.Oh I see all this is that what
they had last night, nour raindelay. I think they were delayed about
an hour and uh yeah, butthey got it anyway, Yeah, but

(03:22):
they got it. Yeah. Congratsto the coach Brooks. Yeah he's been
doing it for a long time andgetting his first one, so you know,
yeah, I appreciate sing that.Well, anyway, we got that.
Now the Guildford Grizzlies and this iswhat you said, your third year,
Yeah, third season here at Gilfordand a chance to win a state

(03:45):
title. Oh baby, oh baby, what's it been like? What kind
of a I mean, let meask you something going into this season,
Going into this season, what wereyour expectations? I mean, knowing what
you had coming back, the teamyou had, did you expect this kind
of a season? I'm I mean, you know, when you're good,

(04:08):
you know what I'm trying to say. You're the number of three seed.
Uh, you had a great regularseason. I had a chance to watch
some of your game when I wasat the softball game adjacent, which made
it real nice. Seventeen and threein the regular season. I mean,
was this expected this year? Youknow, we we certainly expected to build

(04:30):
upon last season success. Last lastseason we finished eleven and nine and we've
you know, eliminated in the firstround of the SEC tournaments to the eventual
champions Fairfield Prep, and then wona won a game and against Massac and
the state tournament and eliminated by theeventual Class l IFI in winsor so,
you know, we played. Weplayed two good games against the eventual champions,

(04:54):
and we knew, we knew kindof good things were coming. We
had a lot of good players returningand some good young talent that we were
anticipating developing. But you know,I as the season kind of wore on,
we you know, we got offto a pretty good start. I
think four and four and two wasour was our start in the first couple
of weeks. You know, wejust kind of challenge our guys just keep

(05:15):
getting better every day. The kidsbought into just kind of taking things one
at a time and really not lookingpast any opponent on the schedule. And
you know, by product of that, we you know, here we are
at the end of the season.We finished seventeen and three, as you
mentioned, and been on a prettygood win streak going back to April,
so it was something you know,we anticipated being successful. I don't know
if we anticipated, you know,the finish that we had, and certainly

(05:38):
wouldn't say we expected to make itthe state championship. Anytime, you know,
you're playing in a single loss eliminationbaseball pad that we know, anything
can happen. But you know,we're happy. Uh, you know,
we're obviously happy with the way thingshave been going and very excited for the
opportunity that's ahead of us tonight andyou know, looking forward to going up
against a very good team from Brookfieldtonight knocked out Notre Dame of West taven

(06:00):
in the semi finals three to one. Yeah right, I don't know,
yea, you know they did actof a job. Anyway, It's not
like this has been, I don'tsay a cakewalk tournament for you. I
mean, you played New London thefirst game, the thirtieth seed. At
one point, were you trailing inthat game? We yeah, we found

(06:21):
ourselves down a couple well a handfulof you know, we've been a handful
of mistakes early in the game andgave us to give us a two hundred
runs and we found ourselves down fournothing after after four and a half inning
bottom of the fifth, we weredown four Wow, the thirtieth seed because
you never know us Yeah, Iknow it good, you know exactly,

(06:42):
you never know. You know,we do not to take any opponents lightly.
And New London capitalizing a couple ofmistakes that we made in the first
two innings. But yeah, unfortunatelyfor us, we were able to get
things going in the bottom of thefifth and we're able to score eleven no
answer runs and kind of come backwith But every every other one since that
has been has been a tight one. I mean Bethel. The next game

(07:02):
you play Bethel and you play themon your own thing is you're playing at
gil where you got nice home fieldadvantage, and there's another close when you
win that game six to five.All right, Yeah, Bethel game was
a good bad and that was areally good high school baseball game. Just
seems like anytime one team scored,the other team found a way to answer,

(07:23):
you know, kind of a goodproduct of some good pitching, defense
and timely swings on both sides.But yeah, one run win against Bethel
then uh and a two nothing winagainst New Sorry Weathersfield in the quarterfinal,
and not a very tight game againsta good team, right, and this
is a two nothing game. Yeah, yeah, that one was two nothing,

(07:46):
and I think our only runs came, you know, on a home
run and then and then us manypeople have heard in Berlin we got one
hit solo home run in the firstinning and that run stood up for the
only run of the game. Soyeah, we've we've been getting used to
and it's something we've done all year. We've been We've been fortunate to come
out on the right side on alot of tight ones. But that's a
product of you know, executing playsand making defensive plays and pitches and getting

(08:09):
getting a good timely hit or arally starter when we needed. But our
guys have been used to playing intype ball games all year long, and
wouldn't expect anything else tonight, That'sfor sure, not at dispoint, But
that burling game out out to bea danny. But let's put it this
way. Anytime I hear one nothing, two nothing's games like that, it's
goott. It comes down to greatpitching. And you got a pitching.

(08:31):
Now. I'm sure Brookfield up wayup there and not listening, but I'm
saying, can you tell who willget the nod tonight to be on the
mound for this game. Yeah,we'll be in. We should be in
pretty good shape. We've got basicallythe whole staff pretty much well rested.
Andrew Andrew show shows through about onehundred pitches on Tuesday night to get us
here, you know, and andand he will, you know, he

(08:54):
would be available three days or astif need be. But we've got you
know, kind of the rest ofthe staff fully arrested to go, guys
like Bryce Meter, sam Amatronto,even Lucas Stash a fie. So really
we've been leaning on four guys heavilymostly throughout the spring, and we're fortunate
that with the way things time outthat you know, we have all four
guys available and ready to go ifif if need be tonight, oh good

(09:18):
does rule will play any small ballif he has to. You know,
we haven't done a ton, Wehaven't done a ton, but so when
when situations call, for sure,you know, we we've we've certainly we've
shown certain times if we have tobunt or you know, move a guy
along, you know we will.We've been we've been fortunate with our lineup
a lot of times, you know, we've been able to kind of rely

(09:39):
on some extra basis and hitting ballsin the gaps, and I think we
have about twelve or thirteen home runsas a team, so we've not not
that we're necessarily you know, thoseold Earl Weaver Oriel teams are kind of
the way the Big League game isgoing around today, waiting around for two
and three run home runs. Butcertainly, you know and the guys know
that if the situation calls for it, we've got to be ready to move

(10:01):
a runner or try to get aguy over or manufacturer a run. And
we've been preparing for a variety ofways to score, and tonight I don't
expect anything different. I think Brookfield'sgot a very good pitching staff. They're
they're in the same boat as uswhere they should have any arms available.
They've got a really good I thinkone of their pitchers going through the numbers,
has seventy innings pitched, which isthe most I've ever heard of,

(10:24):
and only given up I think maybeless than ten runs. So they've they've
had some success, and I thinkthey've leaned on some good arms as well.
I think it'll be a well pitchedball game and probably will come down
to which which lineup can kind ofbreak through first. Here, I was
just gonna say, getting the firstrunner scoring first always means quite a bit,

(10:45):
I'm sure in these games. Butagain, if you've got a well
pitched game going, you might bethere. Who knows, but you know,
the skill per team as looking atthe scores, as the ability obviously
the score runs and hit some homeruns. You're right. So I'm just
looking to see what Brookfield had done. I mean, they won fifteen to
six, five to nothing, fiveto nothing. Again, it wasn't Leonard,

(11:09):
I mean so uh and then yeahthey were named three to one.
Definitely they've had you know, andand they they also, you know,
not just successful in their state tournament, but they made it to the championship
game in their conference tournament as well, So you know, and anytime you
make it to a game of thismagnitude, you know, the other guys
want it just as bad as wedo. And I don't think anybody necessarily

(11:33):
deserves to win one. I thinktonight one of the two teams is going
to come out and earn it,and it's probably gonna come down to just
you know which teams making more ofthe routine plays and coming up with a
big hit. So what did youdo when you play? Did you ever
go for a state championship? Notin baseball? I made it to We
lost one year in the in thesemifinals, lost the game to Fairfield Ludlove
at Palmerfield in the semi final.I played in the football state championship as

(11:58):
a quarterback. That was my onlytrip. So yes, I do,
I remember that, And of coursetell them, I mean, here,
you are coaching at Guildford, butyou went where I went to high school
a Daniel hand. That's what I'msaying, you coach, Yeah, I've
been coaching at your arch rival.Wait a minute, Yeah, yeah it
was. Well, you know,I'm a fifth grade teacher in Madison and

(12:20):
it takes my kids a little bitof time to understand why why I switched
over to Guildford. But I've beenYeah, it's been you know a couple
of years ago. When the opportunityfor a head coaching job came up.
I was, you know, fortunateenough to get hired to Guildford and very
thankful for the for the community andGuildford. The baseball community has been has
been welcoming and really embracing what we'redoing over the last couple of seasons,

(12:41):
and uh, you know, eventhrough some of the ups and downs early.
But yeah, very thankful to theschool and the administration it was kind
of stuck by us and really supportus along the way. So it's one
great imagine this. You had togo from the black and the goal to
the green and the white. Yeah, I'd I'd be lying if I said
the green didn't take a little bitof getting used to those first couple weeks.

(13:03):
Now, I don't want to hearthis. We're Gilford gif My my
son coaches out in Guilford. Youknow. Yeah, boys basketball had no
trouble when you let me tell yousomething, Nick, when you win,
I can wear any color, don'tmatter, doesn't matter. Well, we
we're doing a whole lot of winning. My first season though, coach,

(13:24):
I know, I know you've beenlisten. You're doing just great. Then.
I think I'm so happy for youand I want you to bring this
home tonight against the Bobcats of Brookfieldfrom the Southwest Conference. Oh baby,
seven o'clock tonight, folks, yougot a nice Saturday now you want to
go see some good baseball seven o'clock. That's of course, there's baseball all

(13:45):
day noon, three thirty and seven. But this is this is one of
our area teams going for the championshipthere at palmer Field. Well, Nick,
I wish you nothing but success tonight, and of course I love the
kids from Guildford. Good kids,and bring it home if you would,
and say a loud all the peoplein Gilford and give a special shake it

(14:07):
to the athletic director Jake Jarvis ofcourse, who I think he's sports a
beard now right? Yeah, hey, don't look and tell him that he
doesn't look any better with or withoutit. I'll tell you right now,
but you tell them your words.That's right. Tell him I said hi,
and I'll talk to him soon Iwill. Nick. Best of luck,

(14:28):
pal Go get him tonight. Thankyou appreciate you having me on any
time. Nick, looking forward toa great matchup tonight. Despite the fact
you're from hand. Although I've hadhand coaches on but they're from hand.
Say this may be a first havinghand player now coaching at Guilford. Oh
my, even even to say it, but hey, listen, you go
get him, get home. Thechampionship all right, thank you.