Kevin Schnall blasts CWS ejection: 'I shouldn't get shooed by another grown man'
Coastal Carolina baseball fell to LSU in Game 2 of the College World Series championship series on June 22, and coach Kevin Schnall wasn't able to be with his team as the Chanticleers' season ended.
Schnall was ejected in the bottom of the first inning for arguing balls and strikes with home plate umpire Angel Campos, who threw out Schnall and Coastal Carolina first base coach Matt Schilling. It was a controversial call, not only because it came in a pivotal game during the championship series, but also because Schnall and Schilling both would have been unavailable for a winner-take-all Game 3 had the Chanticleers won Game 2.
Schnall blasted the ejection in a postgame news conference following Coastal Carolina's 5-3 loss.
"There's 25,000 people there and I vaguely hear a warning issued," Schnall said when asked whether he had been issued a warning before his ejection. "As the head coach, I was an assistant for 24 years. As an assistant you're almost treated like a second-grade, second-level citizen and you can't say a word. Now as a head coach, I think it is your right to get an explanation of why we got warned. And I'm 48 years old. I shouldn't get shooed by another grown man. So, when I come out to ask what the warning is, a grown man shooed me.
"So, at that point I can now hear him say it was a warning issued for balls and strikes. And at that point I said, 'Because you missed three.' At that point, ejected. If that warrants an ejection, I'm the first one to stand here like a man and apologize."
Schnall, a first-year head coach, was an assistant at Coastal Carolina under Gary Gilmore from 2001-12 and again from 2016-24 before being promoted.
The veteran college baseball coach also shared his viewpoint on what transpired after he was ejected: As Schnall approached home plate umpire Angel Campos, first base umpire Casey Moser came over and tripped as he aimed to get in the middle of Schnall and Campos' exchange.
"Two words that define are program are, 'Own it.' And what does that mean?" Schnall said. "It means you have to own everything that you do, without blame, without defending yourself, without excuses. If you guys watch the video, there was a guy that came in extremely aggressively, tripped over Campos' foot, embarrassed in front of 25,000, immediately goes 'two-game suspension,' and said 'bumping the umpire.' Immediately does that.
"There was no bump. He was embarrassed. I shouldn't be held accountable for a grown man's athleticism. They'll retract it, though. Because now it's excessive and the reason why it was excessive is because I was trying to say, 'I didn't bump him.'"
It's uncertain how Schnall's presence in the dugout would've impacted Coastal Carolina's result in Game 2, if at all. Associate head coach Chad Oxendine, who spent the previous three seasons as head coach for Longwood baseball, ultimately finished the game as acting head coach.
But the decision to eject the Chanticleers' coach is one that'll certainly be remembered.
"It is what it is, but if that warranted an ejection, man, (there'd) be a lot of ejections," Schnall said. "As an umpire, I feel like it's your job to manage the game, the national championship game, with some poise, some calmness and a little bit of tolerance."
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QUICK WORK: A rarity in college baseball, both games in the championship series were under three hours —2:35 Saturday and 2:55 Sunday.
