In the short term, when the Marquette Academy baseball team outlasted Brimfield at the home of the Illinois Valley Pistol Shrimp last week to win the Class 2A St. Bede Supersectional, it sent the Crusaders back to the IHSA State Finals, where they eventually placed third.

In the long term, it also guaranteed Marquette – a non-boundaried private school with a listed coed enrollment of just 135 students but subject to the IHSA’s Success Adjustment Policy thanks to its three consecutive state appearances – will remain in Class 2A for baseball through at least the 2028 season.

“Playing up” didn’t seem to bother this spring’s Crusaders.

Marquette finished the season with a sparkling 38-4 record, winning its first 21 ballgames and shortly thereafter the Tri-County Conference, Bishop McNamara Regional, Indian Creek Sectional and St. Bede Supersectional titles. Its lone postseason loss came in the state semifinals to eventual 2A champion St. Joe-Ogden.

“We’ve heard it from everybody the last two years,” Marquette ace pitcher and 2026 graduate Alec Novotney said of the team’s success coming in Class 1A, “and from the very first practice we embraced it the whole year. We’ve been playing with confidence and a chip on our shoulder that we can beat anybody we play.

“I think we did [prove we belonged in 2A. Third place] wasn’t the game we wanted to win, but we still went 1-1 down here, got third place. Not many teams can say that.”

It wasn’t the first time Marquette found success as part of the 2A field. Sandwiched between the Cru’s Class 1A state championships in 2019 and the back-to-back 2024 and 2025 1A titles, Marquette claimed 2A regional and sectional championships in 2021. It did the same in 2014 during a brief tenure in 2A.

Veteran Marquette coach Todd Hopkins – who over 28 seasons has led the Crusaders to all 17 of the regional championships, 11 sectional titles, seven state finals appearances and three state championships in program history – put it succinctly after Saturday’s 4-1 victory over a 30-win Freeburg team in the Class 2A third-place game.

“I think we showed that we can play in 2A,” he said.

The IHSA’s Success Adjustment Policy was modified last year. The new policy reads:

“Entering each school year, if a [non-boundaried school] team has won two state final trophies in the past three years in a sport, they will then be subject to the adjustment and move up one class in that sport.”

Having brought home 1A’s first-place trophy in both 2024 and 2025, followed by 2026’s 2A third-place trophy, Marquette – for baseball only, as a school’s success in one sport does not affect other sports – will remain in 2A for at least the 2027 and 2028 seasons.

Although this year’s team was most certainly senior-led by starters such as Novotney, third-place game winning pitcher Anthony Couch, center fielder Grant Dose and catcher Jaxsen Higgins, six of the 10 players in the starting lineup last weekend at Champaign’s Illinois Field are eligible to return next spring. That includes a pair of players who launched home runs in Saturday’s third-place contest and pitched high-impact innings this season – seniors-to-be Easton DeBernardi and Griffin Dobberstein.

“Practice hard, make sure we get better every day, work as a team and stay coachable. All those things,” DeBernardi said of what it will take for Marquette to continue to be a state powerhouse, no matter what class the Crusaders play in.

“Honestly, we just have to stick to our brand of baseball,” Dobberstein said. “This year we hit the ball around a lot, but [our focus needs to be on] no errors, throw strikes, play good defense, hit the ball when needed. Just continue the work [our seniors] put in, follow their example.

“They’ve provided a great example the last four years here. We just have to try to follow in their footsteps.”