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Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated
Patrick Andres

Closed School's Epic Division III College World Series Run to Become Documentary

If you followed along with Birmingham-Southern College's run to the Division III College World Series, you probably had the thought at one time or another that the Panthers' heroics were the stuff of movies.

Fortunately, the film industry agrees with you.

A documentary film crew followed Birmingham-Southern's baseball team around for the last two weeks of the school's existence, Blue Eyes Entertainment executive producer Jason Sciavicco told Kennington Smith III of The Athletic Wednesday. Per Sciavicco, the company will put together a feature length-documentary "as soon as possible."

"The story was so pure," Sciavicco said. "Here’s a group of kids playing D-III baseball, and their school is closing. They were 13-10 when they found out their school was closing (in March). How easy would it have been to mail it in? Instead, they finished the season 25-4 and went on a run."

The final push landed the Panthers in the Division III College World Series, which began the day the century-old liberal arts school officially shut down. After losing 7-5 to Salve Regina in the first round, Birmingham-Southern rallied past Randolph-Macon 9-7 with a walk-off home run.

The Panthers fell 11-10 to Wisconsin-Whitewater in the second round on yet another walk-off home run, but their story appears destined to live on in baseball lore.

PATRICK ANDRES

Patrick Andres has been a Staff Writer on the Breaking & Trending News Team at Sports Illustrated since 2022. Before SI, his work appeared in The Blade, Athlon Sports, Fear the Sword, and Diamond Digest. Patrick has covered everything from zero-attendance Big Ten basketball to a seven-overtime college football game. He is a graduate of Northwestern University.

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