Marcus Phillips, a 2022 graduate of Roosevelt High School, was a part of the Tennessee Volunteer baseball team which won the program’s first national title this year.
Phillips and the Volunteers took down Texas A&M in the College World Series, winning the final two games after dropping the best-of-three series opener in Omaha. Phillips came in as a relief pitcher in game one of the series, recording two scoreless outs including one strikeout and throwing 18 pitches.
Marcus grew up on the baseball field. His dad, Steve Phillips, played college baseball at Kentucky before playing five years of professional baseball within the New York Yankees organization. Once Steve’s playing career ended, he got into coaching and spent 10 years as a coach in the minor leagues. This family connection provided Marcus with a special look into the game of baseball.
“I started playing baseball before I actually started playing baseball if that makes sense.” Marcus said, “My dad was still coaching pro baseball at the time, and I would always go out on the field post-game and play with him, whether it was playing catch or hitting wiffle balls. I was always around baseball.”
From those early days on the field with his dad, Marcus eased his way into coach pitch and then joined an unorganized team with friends for a year before hopping into the Cyclones program (now the Sanford Sports Academy), for which he played up until he graduated. Marcus was a key player, both as a pitcher and hitter, bringing the South Dakota team to the Little League World Series for the first time in 2017.
“I felt like my high school career and playing travel ball was more about hanging out with friends and playing ball with friends,” Phillips reflected.
Coming out of high school, Phillips had two offers to play college ball, one from Kansas and one from Iowa Western Junior College, and after visits to both, he chose to commit to Iowa Western.
A few weeks after his commitment, the entire coaching staff left for Western Kentucky where they offered Phillips a scholarship, but he did not feel that was a road he wanted to pursue. Phillips stuck with Iowa Western but began the search for a new program.
Throughout high school, Phillips attended Prep Baseball Report camps, which led to Phillips and his dad developing a strong relationship with Rob Allison, the director of those camps. Allison got in touch with Tennessee for Phillips, and the coaches reached out to get him on campus. Two weeks later, Phillips committed to being a Tennessee Volunteer the following year.
“I don’t think there’s a ton of similarities (between junior college and playing at Tennessee). It’s really crazy going from playing in front of 10 to 15 people to playing in front of 7,000 every single weekend. It’s a big jump, and there’s a lot of resources that come with that,” Phillips said. “Being able to work towards a national championship at the very best of your ability every single day is what got us there but being able to go be a part of that championship team, it is something I’m never going to forget. It’s a blessing to be a part of that and (the team) it’s a group of brothers now.”
