38 and counting: FIU’s Garrett Wittels has a hitting streak for the Division I record books

FIU’s Garrett Wittels on a streak to savor

MIAMI — Garrett Wittels started this year as an afterthought on the FIU baseball roster, set to be a late-inning replacement and little else.

Surprise!

He’s headed for the NCAA record books.

Wittels has gone to bat in 38 games this season — and gotten a hit in every one. It’s the best current stretch in the country, and according to the NCAA, marks the 10th-longest streak recorded at the Division I level. Most surprisingly, it’s been put together by someone who was terrible as a freshman at the plate a year ago.

“I always knew that once I had a chance and really got into the lineup, I wouldn’t get out,” Wittels said.

He wasn’t kidding.

A .246 hitter last year — including a two-month stretch where he batted just .188 — Wittels is hitting .404 this season, with 39 RBIs in 38 games. And he’s doing it without a set position either, having spent time this year at shortstop, second base, third base and even pitching in three games.

As far as the streak goes, well, Wittels prefers to have his bat do most of the talking. There are superstitions in baseball, foremost among them never doing anything to jinx a streak, so Wittels understandably doesn’t want to hype himself too much.

“Once you think you’ve made it, you’ll go 0 for 20,” Wittels said before practice Tuesday. “You’ll hit the ball hard right at people, not be able to buy a hit and you won’t do anything. That’s what I learned from struggling last year. You can’t get your ups too high, and you can’t let your downs get too down, because at any time, the baseball gods will put you right back in your place.”

Those baseball gods can also come through when needed, a lesson Wittels learned Sunday.

Here’s the situation: Bottom of the eighth, FIU trailing Louisiana-Monroe 7-4, runner on second, no outs. Wittels went to the plate, 0 for 3 on the day, the hitting streak on the line.

One thought was in his head. And it wasn’t the streak.

“I had to get the tying run to the plate,” Wittels said.

He dug his cleats into the dirt.

Ball one. Ball two. Ball three. Ball four.

Wittels went to first without the bat ever getting off his shoulder.

“That shows he is absolutely a team guy first,” FIU coach Turtle Thomas said. “It’s not about Garrett. It’s about FIU baseball, no question about it.”

Some teammates tipped their caps, and the first-base umpire quietly offered congratulations, thinking the streak had surely ended.

Then those baseball gods showed up.

Wittels got another chance in the ninth, slapping a hard single through the left side of the infield, helping FIU tie the game. The Panthers wound up losing 8-7 in 11 innings, but the streak lived on, and Wittels will try to stretch it to 39 games Wednesday when FIU visits Bethune-Cookman.

The Division I record for a longest hitting streak is 58 games, by Robin Ventura for Oklahoma State in 1987. Three other players, according to the NCAA, have had 38-game streaks. And if Wittels keeps this going much longer, he’ll vault up the NCAA list — only three batters have ever had hitting streaks of more than 42 games at the D-I level.

“It’s an unbelievable accomplishment, to say the least,” Thomas said. “We don’t ever talk about it. I don’t want to bring any more attention to it than already is there. Everybody knows, but from my standpoint, let’s just play the game, play the game. Play baseball.”

Wittels has the same approach.

“You can’t try to do too much,” Wittels said. “You can’t do something that isn’t meant to happen.”