Coach Nick Mingione hugs his son after Saturday’s win. (Vicky Graff Photo)
Kentucky got dramatic solo home runs from Ryan Nicholson and Mitchell Daly along with some clutch pitching to make its College World Series debut Saturday with a 10-inning, 5-4 win over North Carolina State Saturday.
However, the star of the postgame press conference again might have been coach Nick Mingione’s son Reeves.
He has been a fixture by his father’s side during this remarkable postseason run for the Cats and I thought you would enjoy the entire conversation when Mingione was asked about sharing Father’s Day with Reeves and then Reeves was asked about the Omaha experience with his dad.
Enjoy:
Q. What is it going to mean to you tomorrow to share Father’s Day with Reeves on this stage? And to Reeves too to share this experience with your dad and get to be here in Omaha.
NICK MINGIONE: “I was trying to get through a press conference without crying, okay? (Laughter). Him and Christen, Christen’s my rock. You know that? She’s my rock. Coaches’ wives, they don’t get enough credit. My wife is amazing. She’s amazing.
“But we get to be his earthly parents. And this guy right here, man. He loves these players. He loves the players. He prays for them. I mean, he’s in it with them.
“And he and I had a cool moment before the game. We were sitting — I was like, Reeves, do you remember early in the year we weren’t ranked. And then we would win a couple games and he immediately wants to know, dad, do you think we’ll be ranked. I’m like no, I don’t think so yet Reeves. We’ve got some work to do.
“Then a couple more wins later, you think we’ll be ranked. I go no. And do you remember, what was the first ranking we thought we were going to get? What was it, like, 26?”
REEVES MINGIONE: “You thought it would be 27 through 30, and we ended up being 25.”
NICK MINGIONE: “I was like, Reeves, they got us! We get a couple more wins, he’s like, do you think we’ll be ranked? And I was, like, yes, Reeves. Then how did it go, do you even remember?”
REEVES MINGIONE: “I think it went 25, 23, 18, 16, and then went back to 21, then maybe 16, 10. Then we went to eight, six, then I think 16 or 18, then the highest we got was around two.”
NICK MINGIONE: “Is this guy locked in or what? So this is where you want to be with your son. This is where you want to be. If you’re a baseball coach, you want to spend Father’s Day there. Yeah, I’m proud of him for so many reasons. But to be able to get to spend it not only with him but with Christen, it would be awesome and looking forward to it, for sure.”
REEVES MINGIONE: “I’m honestly kind of glad that we have the day off tomorrow. (Laughter). I just can’t wait to just watch baseball with him and just hang around with him all day long.”
