John Anderson has worked the coaching table for 20 years at Minnesota, playing hands to the best of his ability every season.

This season he was stripped of two aces but kept his poker face on and manufactured a winning hand once again.

Anderson lost standout pitchers Dan McGrath and Ben Birk for most of the season but still led his team to a 39-21 record, Big Ten tournament championship and a NCAA tournament berth.

“We had high expectations going into the season,” Anderson said. “We had a team that felt it would be pretty good, but that included McGrath and Birk, and those two changes had an impact on our season.”

McGrath was lost for the season when the NCAA renounced his eligibility after he spent a semester going to school in Australia.

Birk was lost for over two months after taking a line drive in the face in early March during a game against Miami.

Initially shaken, the team used adversity to forge an indomitable will. Young teammates stepped in and kept the team, surprisingly some say, on a winning track.

“If you would have told me in January that we’d be without Birk and McGrath for the season and still finish a game out of first in the Big Ten,” assistant head coach Rob Fornasiere said, “I would have been ecstatic.”

He added that the loss of McGrath was the “most disappointing thing professionally that I’ve experienced at the University of Minnesota.”

Anderson admitted the team, relying on a depleted and inexperienced pitching rotation, “may have overachieved some” while playing quality baseball all but one weekend.

“I think the weekend at Ohio State cost us,” pitcher Mike Kobow said. “That cost us the Big Ten regular season title. It was the first time I’ve ever been swept (in a series). That was disappointing.”

Minnesota exacted revenge, winning the Big Ten tournament in Columbus and earning an automatic bid into the NCAA tournament.

Despite being in position to beat defending national champion LSU, the Gophers were ousted from their regional after two games.

Looking ahead, Minnesota loses six seniors, including Josh Holthaus and Kurt Haring, who contributed a combined 97 RBI this year.

The Gophers could also lose juniors Kobow and Big Ten player of the year Jack Hannahan to the Major League Baseball draft next week.

Hannahan and Kobow both earned All-Big Ten first-team honors, and Hannahan garnered a third team All-America award.

“When you lose a good player, the key to a solid program is having another player to step in for him,” Fornasiere said.

Minnesota will be bringing in a solid recruiting class to fill holes on the mound and behind the plate, bringing in catchers Andy Hunter from Sibley High School in West St. Paul, and Jake Elder out of Vancouver, B.C., along with five pitchers.

In addition, some of the fresh faces in the bullpen this year received increased opportunities to shine.

“A lot of our young pitchers got a lot of experience this year and I like our freshman class pitching wise,” Anderson said. “We have high expectations.”

The ante is now raised and Anderson hopes to make his next hand a winning one.

ï Center fielder Sam Steidl made Baseball Weekly’s freshmen All-America team after hitting .401 on the season.

Anthony Maggio welcomes comments at [email protected]