Notes from the President's Office No. 17: The Summer Koshien

August 21, 2023

Kohei Itoh, President, Keio University

There is a certain way to win a tournament. Especially when aiming for the championship, the key is how you can win the early matches with a sense of ease. If you use all your energy from the first game, you will run out of steam as you advance. This ease means being able to enjoy the game you love as a competition, and being able to handle any crisis calmly without panicking, allowing you to perform at your usual level. If you aim to win the championship, you must have the mental composure to always believe, somewhere in your heart, that you will not lose to your opponent. I recall when I competed in tennis tournaments at various levels in my youth; when I achieved good results, even in what appeared to be close matches score-wise, I won the early games with a sense of mental ease. This allowed me to unleash my full potential against the truly tough opponents I faced later in the tournament.

Now, about this year's Summer Koshien. The Keio Senior High School (Jukuko) baseball team is making great strides. Having won the Kanagawa prefectural tournament, which is packed with powerhouse teams of a national caliber, they are naturally a team capable of winning the championship at Koshien. As it is my alma mater, my excitement as an alumnus is immense. And as President, my greatest hope was that they would display a refreshing style of play from the very first game—one befitting a championship team, exuding a sense of ease. This year's team has not only brilliantly met those expectations but has shown a level of refreshing play beyond my imagination.

When various people ask me, "Mr. President, do you go to cheer at every game?" I have been answering, "I will go to the final and one other game before that." This is because I have believed from the start that they will truly win the championship, as it is hard to imagine a team as strong in a tournament as this year's Jukuko team. When I went to Koshien to cheer for them in the third-round match against Koryo High School, I told Mr. Takeshi Nagano, the president of the Jukuko alumni association, "Since they're going to win the championship, winning is a given. The real challenge is whether they can continue to win while maintaining even a slight sense of ease." He laughed and replied, "Kohei-san, as President, you can't make that comment publicly, can you?" Precisely because our opponent, Koryo, was also a championship contender and a wonderful team, I felt that we in the cheering section had to fight with the same spirit as the players, believing in victory. In a tournament, if you lose heart thinking it's all over if you lose, victory will slip away in that very moment. In fact, the Jukuko baseball team, united with Manager Moribayashi and the players, enjoyed the competition and, no matter the crisis (for example, when the opposing team had a runner on second base in the bottom of the ninth), they demonstrated their usual pitching and defense. A team that possesses such strength and refreshing spirit is the pride of Keio.

Now, the final match is the day after tomorrow. I had cleared my schedule assuming the final would be held on the 22nd (Tuesday) as originally planned, but the game schedule was postponed by a day due to a typhoon. Nevertheless, while I would love to overcome all obstacles to rush to the Koshien final, on the 23rd (Wednesday), I have an overseas business trip for which the schedule has been arranged down to the minute for over half a year. Our opponent is Sendai Ikuei Gakuen High School, to whom we lost in a tie-breaker in the first round of the Spring Invitational Tournament. The final will be an all-out battle where we can't think about what comes next, and the time has come to repay our debt from Koshien at Koshien. I am truly looking forward to seeing how Keio Senior High School will play. I believe that all of Jukuko, led by Senior High School Principal Akuzawa, will unite as one and win the championship with the support of the Jukuko Cheerleading Team, the brass band, the Keio Girls Senior High School baton team, and the Keio Gijuku Shachu.