Heller adjusting to his new normal

While the Iowa head coach is still focused on the game he loves, how he has spent his time the last four months has been very different. Instead of being on the diamond coaching the Hawkeyes, Heller was stuck at home doing Zoom calls and trying to adjust to life without the game he loves. Instead of being at the ball park watching and evaluating high school prospects, Heller and his staff are trying to catch games on-line and doing their best to track potential prospects.

It’s a whole new world for Heller who thrives in his routine. Now that routine is very different, but he’s come to enjoy it.

“The first couple of months were really hard,” Heller said. “I finally had to sit back and realize I had no control. I really didn’t have a plan to try and relax, but in the last six weeks I have kind of been at peace with it and really enjoying the time I have had with my family and still do my work during the week.”

Back in the middle of March, Heller and the Hawkeyes were coming along nicely with a 10-5 record and were headed to California for a weekend series. Then Covid-19 not only canceled the series, the rest of the season.

Heller was likely headed towards his seventh straight season of 30 or more wins leading the Hawkeye program and potentially, Iowa could have made the NCAA Tournament. Instead, Heller and the Iowa baseball team were left trying to figure out the future.

The good news for the Hawkeyes is the NCAA has allowed seniors from spring sports to return for another year. Iowa came up with the scholarship money to cover those costs and as things stand right now, nine of the seniors have decided to return for another year. The players moving on. Pitcher Grant Judkins signed a free agent deal with the Oakland A’s and outfielder Justin Jenkins has decided to graduate and move on to a career outside of baseball.

With those nine other seniors likely returning, Heller also feels good about his recruiting efforts for the next two classes, which means he’s not as concerned about the missed recruiting opportunities this summer.

“We didn’t have a sense urgency to replace three or four guys for next year, especially with the seniors coming back. We have a really good class coming in and a good group of commits already for 2021, so that took some pressure off us.”

One positive development this past month has been that while the Iowa baseball season wasn’t completed, Heller’s players are now back on the diamond around the state of Iowa.

“A lot of our guys were playing in the local leagues that started about a month ago in the Iowa Valley leagues and things like that. Now we have the more official leagues starting up and quite a few of our guys are playing in the Northwoods League,” Heller said.

Unfortunately, some of the teams in the Northwoods League in Wisconsin did not play this year, but Iowa does have nine players back on the diamond. Heller hopes to continue to add more players to teams this season.

Another project that seems to be gaining steam during the hiatus is the long desired move of college baseball back at least one month to the middle of March. With every athletic department looking at significant budget cuts in the next year, moving the start of the season back a month would mean northern schools would not have to take lengthy road trips to Florida or California in February.

“If we can eliminate the travel on those four weekends and either host games or play closer to home and cut down on the travel costs, that would save programs a lot of money,” he said.

With the added credibility that Big Ten programs have gained in recent years, the Big Ten coaches have been pushing hard for this change starting next season. This time around, Heller feels like they have a better shot than in the past.

“The Big Ten coaches are really pushing for this and we are getting great feedback from other coaches across the country and I think we have a legitimate chance to get it passed.”