By Hunt Palmer
Being that LSU’s baseball program has produced more postseason drama than any other, sometimes heroic efforts can get lost in time.
The Tigers have won a pair of national titles with walk off hits, one by the most likely of candidates—Brad Cresse–and one by perhaps the least—Warren Morris.
Ty Floyd and Brett Laxton rolled up massive strikeout total in Omaha, but both were elite draft prospects and established pitchers. Tommy White’s walkoff against Wake Forest will live forever, but White set the national record for freshman home runs.
All of those led to national championships, too.
What transpired in Chapel Hill last June may ultimately be forgotten in the big picture. An unlikely source provided a heroic effort in a season that ended prematurely, at least by LSU’s standards.
With LSU’s season on the brink and bullpen arms dwindling, Jay Johnson handed the ball to Will Hellmers. The senior sidewinder had worked less than 18 innings on the season.
North Carolina held a 2-1 lead in the second inning of a winner-take-all regional final and had already chased starter Sam Dutton and reliever Javen Coleman with three hits and a pair of walks.
“It was a terrible start to the game, walking guys, hits all over the place,” Hellmers said. “Then just as soon as I got in there, I was like this is either gonna be the last time I pitch ever, or we’re gonna win, and we’re going to Omaha.”
Though it was only the regional round, LSU was assured a home Super Regional the following week. That inspired confidence that if the Tigers could escape North Carolina, a trip to Omaha to defend a national championship felt inevitable.
But with star closer Griffin Herring unavailable, the Tiger bullpen would be stretched. Hellmers’s long outing of the season was two innings. LSU was going to need more.
“My mind was like, I’m going out there, and I’m not giving up the ball until it’s until it’s almost over, and I wanted to finish the game,” Hellmers said.
For a stretch, it appeared possible. The New Orleans native faced just one over the minimum in the third, fourth, fifth and sixth, setting down 12 in a row at one point as his offense managed single runs in the second and third to take a 3-2 lead.
“I was dominating one of the best teams in the country,” Hellmers remembered his mindset during the outing. “It’s freaking awesome. I’m going back in the dugout pumped up. I just love competing, and I didn’t have a lot of long outings last year, but I had a lot in crucial spots. All that collectively together, pitching against one of the top eight teams in the country, I knew this could be my last time to pitch. I just thought, let’s go dominate.”
Eight-hole hitter Alex Madera snapped the streak of a dozen set down with a leadoff single in the seventh. Then Colby Wilkerson laid down a sacrifice bunt to move the tying run to the second with one out for the feared duo of Vance Honeycutt and Casey Cook at the top of the Tar Heel order.
“Coach tried to take the ball from me in the seventh with a runner on second,” Hellmers said. “I was like, no, absolutely not, and that was the first time I think he said OK.”
Johnson felt it was the right move at the time. Honeycutt, who would be the 22nd pick in the MLB Draft a month later, grounded out to third. That set the stage for Cook who led the Tar Heels in hits and runs driven in.
“Cook was hitting who, in my opinion, was a guy we really had to pay close attention to not let beat us,” Johnson said. “He was overshadowed a little bit by Honeycutt. I went out to the mound, and it maybe wasn’t the right move at the time, but I’m like you know what with what this guy has given us, I can live with myself if he gives up a homer here, and we lose because of everything that Will poured into this for three years.
“And he got him to pop up to leftfield. It’s one of coolest moments of my coaching career to go, like, hey man, I’m totally at peace with how this goes because of who this kid is and what he gave us.”
It was Hellmers’s final contribution to the program. The final linescore read 5.2 innings pitched, two hits, no runs, four strikeouts.”
With two innings to play, Hellmers had given his team a chance.
Though Carolina scratched a ninth inning run to tie the game and another in the 11th to win it, Hellmers had given his best effort in his last effort.
The outing was the culmination of a four-year career that started at third base on Opening Night of 2021 and included freshman All-America honors as a pitcher. Hellmers won six games and worked 39.2 innings as a rookie.
Over the next two seasons, he would only pitch 22 total innings. He never considered leaving for a fresh start.
“I grew up in New Orleans, went to Jesuit,” Hellmers said. “LSU was it for me. I wanted to be a Tiger through and through. I had a great freshman year, All-American. Played a little third base, all that good stuff, and then my sophomore and junior years was just kind of like I’m trying to find my spot, trying to find my role in the pitching staff. I truthfully struggled to find a good role, and I threw 22 innings but throughout that whole time, I still wanted to be a Tiger.”
While he didn’t carve out a prominent role as a pitcher, he did as a leader. Hellmers was frequently seen leading team huddles, lightening the mood when necessary and doing whatever he could to boost morale.
“You know everybody has a role on each team. Some guys are your superstars. Some guys are role players. You have locker room guys, and you just have guys who know baseball or just are good people, and I think Hellmers has been every part of every one of those roles I just listed,” said former Tiger teammate Cade Beloso. “He’s just such a good dude, and he is well respected by every guy in the locker room. He just meant the world to those teams, including 2023, and obviously last year.”
Roster limits mean coaches must make decisions before traveling to the College World Series in Omaha. Only so many players can be designated as active, and a couple of more can be in uniform but inactive.
When LSU beat Kentucky in 2023 to advance to the College World Series, Johnson had an easy decision.
“He was easily the first player that was off the roster that was gonna be in the dugout,” Johnson said. “First slot, Will Hellmers.”
To this day that honor still sticks with Hellmers.
“You gotta find your way into being a crucial part of that team,” Hellmers said. “The pregame speeches are just a part of it. It’s really cool to do that and get on a video or whatever, but really the whole goal is to get these guys fired up and ready to play. Dylan Crews is gonna play every day. Skenes is gonna pitch every Friday night. You need to be behind them, support them. That’s kind of where I found my role. Just to be able to be in the dugout in Omaha, that meant a whole lot to me.”
It’s possible LSU never gets to Omaha without a team meeting called two weeks prior.
The Tigers were bounced from the SEC Tournament after back-to-back 5-4 losses to Arkansas and Texas A&M. The team was a little disheartened having lost two of its final three SEC weekends entering Hoover.
A team that had played with the weight of the No. 1 ranking from February through April was limping into postseason play.
“The locker room vibes were low, so we had a closed doors meeting,” Beloso said. “Hellmers was the first guy that stood up and said something. He’s said, ‘if you think about it this way, we have one more chance essentially all play together,’ and he is now he’s starting to look at people in the room talking to me and Gavin (Dugas) saying how we’re fifth years about to move on, and then he’s talking to Dylan and Paul and a couple other draft guys and then some freshman. He said we will never get another opportunity like this ever again.”
LSU played its best baseball the next two weeks, winning the five NCAA Tournament games by a total score of 48-17.
“We really came together as a team in there and in that hotel,” Hellmers said. “Those guys after that really just freaking went after it, and so I do think that was a huge turning point. The talent was always there, and it’s not up to the coaches to be able to put a team together and create chemistry. That’s on the team.”
Hellmers’s days on the team at LSU are over. He’s spent much of his time hunting and fishing since stepping off the mound in Chapel Hill. He’s looking for a path back into the world of sports where he has spent the last nearly two decades.
While the memory of hearing the North Carolina celebration as he conducted his press conference still stings a little bit, the four years that led up to that moment ease that pain.
“I had an awesome career at LSU,” Hellmers said. “Had two different head coaches, four different pitching coaches, three different strength coaches. I racked up on the coaches, and I got to learn a lot about not only sports but teamwork, becoming a man. LSU’s program with the fan base that is here in Baton Rouge is just unmatched. It’s the cathedral of college baseball, and it’s just where you want to be. I couldn’t have spent four years better.”
