Once he told his roommate, Nick Murphy, his plans, Wyatt Cameron knew he couldn’t walk it back. He went and did it, dyed his mustache in Central Connecticut’s shade of blue and walked onto the bus to New York.
“I kept my head low, didn’t want to make it too obvious,” Cameron said. “But every kid who saw it and said, ‘What’s up?’ did a double take, like, ‘Is that real? You actually did that?’ It was funny to see all the reactions and disbelief that I dyed my mustache blue.”
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With the ‘stache, long hair and craggy features, Cameron, a grad student, looked more like Wyatt Earp when he took the mound in the Northeast Conference Tournament — if they served blueberry smoothies in the old, wild west. Cameron took the ball and pitched, and pitched and pitched again, four times in three days, and in the showdown game Sunday, he held LIU scoreless for 4 2/3 innings, until the Blue Devils pushed the winning run across in the 12th inning to win the title in Wappingers Falls, N.Y.
“Winning the championship was just unbelievable,” Cameron said. “The day after, it’s still shocking. That may be the best day of my entire life. It’s certainly the best day of baseball in my entire life. It’s something I’ve dreamt about since I was a little kid, i never really had crazy expectations, but it was always still a dream, I’d love to go out there, go play in a Regional.”
On Monday, CCSU’s players learned they’re heading to Alabama, to the NCAA Tournament to play Auburn on Friday at 7 p.m., with Stetson and NC State also in that double-elimination regional. Fairfield, the MAAC champ, will play Coastal Carolina at Conway, S.C., Friday at 6 p.m., with Florida and East Carolina also in that group.
Chris Brown, Colby Brouillette and Wyatt Cameron (left to right) with the NEC championship trophy. (CCSU athletics)
But UConn will be missing from the tournament for the first time since 2017. The Huskies went into selection Sunday hopeful, but on the bubble. Several upsets in conference tournaments swallowed up bids, made the selection committee’s job trickier, and just one team from the Big East, Creighton, the tournament champ, was selected. UConn and Xavier were left out.
The conference’s overall lack of strength and Huskies’ 3-6 record against Creighton and Xavier, despite a 16-0 record against the rest of the Big East, appeared to count heavily against them. UConn had victories over several teams in the NCAA field, including Vanderbilt, the No.1 overall seed, and North Carolina, No. 5. Though UConn’s metrics would usually merit selection, it came down to a numbers crunch in 2025 and the Huskies’ season ended on an empty note.
Central (31-15), which will be playing in the tournament for the ninth time since 2002, has never won a regional, but has often played the traditional national powers competitively. Cameron transferred from Division III New England College in Henniker, N.H., to Central because he saw the winning tradition and wanted a chance to pitch for a championship.
“Halfway through the last game, he made it very clear he was going to be available and wanted the chance with the ball,” coach Charlie Hickey said. “When you have competitive kids who work hard for you, and you ask them to be competitive, at times you have to let them be competitive.”
Cameron was on the mound when a championship game was lost at his previous school, which was in the back of his mind when LIU walked it off against him in the first game on Sunday, forcing the winner-take-all finale. He had already pitched 2 2/3 winnings Friday and 2 2/3 on Saturday to finish the first two Central wins, and give Hickey No. 800 in his career. With the final game going back and forth, Cameron relieved Vincent Borghese, but LIU tied the game in the eighth inning. Antonio Ducatelli threw out a runner at the plate to preserve the tie.
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“I wasn’t really feeling my arm, so that wasn’t a factor at all,” Cameron said. “It was more just, ‘You’ve got to do this for your teammates, for the guys who have worked with you all year long to be here, who have earned this.’”
For the teammates who did the double-takes at his blue ‘stache, Cameron threw more than 50 pitches, keeping the game scoreless until the Devils’ Brady Short scored on a wild pitch. Then Cameron, the tournament MVP closed it out.
“I knew this could be my last game wearing a college jersey, playing in an organized game,” he said.
Now, Cameron has promised teammates he will dye something else blue, possibly his eyebrows. When this all ends, he has been joking, he will probably go back to his native Vermont and play in “an old men’s league.” It’s that time of year, to sell out and do whatever it takes to extend a season, a career one more day.
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“We weren’t going to lose without running our best out there,” Hickey said. “I can imagine when you go to a SEC school and their facilities and their fan base, it’s something I hope our kids enjoy the experience and relish the opportunity of doing something they won’t do again.”
Fairfield, playing in the tournament for the third time, clinched the MAAC Tournament with a 7-6 win over Rider as freshman Nolan Colby hit a 10th-inning homer.
Vanderbilt, one of 13 SEC teams in the field, is tops among the eight teams that would have homefield advantage for the Regional and Super Regional phases of the tournament. Texas is No. 2. Auburn is the fourth overall seed, and Coast Carolina No. 13, so CCSU and Fairfield are in brackets that funnel into the same Super Regional. The final eight teams meet at the College World Series in Omaha begins June 13.
Originally Published: May 26, 2025 at 6:31 PM EDT