2017 2017 DIVISION 1 COLLEGE PREVIEW
New England Baseball Journal
February 2017
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FAIRFIELD RISING
Could the Stags — returning their entire rotation from their first tournament team — become New England’s next power?
By Dan Guttenplan
The 2016 college baseball season was
particularly rewarding for Division 1 teams
in New England, as — for the first time ever
— five New England teams qualified for
the NCAA tournament.
Of the five — Boston College, Bryant,
UConn, Fairfield and Rhode Island — Fairfield
served as the biggest surprise. The
Stags were picked to finish eighth in the
MAAC preseason coaches’ poll, and had
not won more than two games in the conference
tournament since 1995.
A year later, Fairfield may be the likeliest
of the five New England teams to return
to the NCAA tournament. The Stags
recently served as the lone representative
from the MAAC to garner at least one
vote in the Collegiate Baseball Fabulous
40 NCAA preseason poll.
It’s a giant step in the right direction
for a Fairfield program that was a perennial
MAAC bottom-feeder before the hire
of coach Bill Currier for the 2012 season.
In the five seasons since, Currier has led
Fairfield to a program record for wins in
two separate seasons (2012, 2016) and
twice has been named MAAC Coach of
the Year (2012, 2016).
“When I got here, we had to change the
environment and thinking of the administration
and how we recruit,” Currier said. “We
want good academic kids who are hungry
to play. We want kids who grew up more on
a baseball field than in a library. We had to
change the way of thinking and start getting
kids who want to practice and lift weights.”
On the heels of last year’s first MAAC
tournament title in school history, Fairfield
returns its entire starting rotation.
Gavin Wallace, John Signore (Wallingford,
Conn.) and Kyle Dube (Southington,
Conn.) are expected to serve as weekend
starters for the second year in a row.
Wallace was an eight-game winner as
a sophomore, and Signore led the nation
for several weeks in strikeout-to-walk ratio
as a freshman.
Signore is somewhat of a prototype of the
new Fairfield baseball player, according to
Currier. The right-hander stands 5-foot-11 and
230 pounds, and doesn’t blow anyone away
with his pitch selection. He served as a closer
at Xavier High (Middletown, Conn.), but Currier
and his staff saw more for him.
“He’s a guy that opposing teams see
warm up, and they can’t wait to grab the
bats off the rack,” Currier said. “By the fifth
inning, they’re wondering if they can find
a way to hit him. He has an uncanny ability
of understanding where he needs to put
the ball and an ability to mix three speeds
at such a young age.”
Signore came to Fairfield for the same
reasons Currier recruited him — the pitcher
believed he was ready to contribute right
away at the Division 1 level, and loved practicing
and working to improve.
“This coaching staff puts in the work,
and they expect us to work just as hard,”
Signore said. “We put in long hours at
practice and on our own. There isn’t one
kid here who does anything other than
work as hard as he can to help us achieve
our team goals.”
Fairfield’s team goals are changing after
the Stags’ historic season. The team’s first
regular-season MAAC title since 1993 and
first conference title ever now has the coach
thinking bigger picture.
“We haven’t won a (NCAA tournament)
regional game,” Currier said.
“That’s what we want to do. Winning a
regional is a long shot for every New England
team. A couple came close last year,
and that’s always
