When the short fly ball dropped into leftfielder Nando Trindade’s glove last Oct. 24, we’d done it. After toiling in darkness and irrelevance for years, the Boston University baseball team had reached one of its primary goals – its first league championship.

Losing only two games all season long, we were the dominant team in the New England Club Baseball Association, our home since the 2001 season. Only the University of New England had beaten us, both games by the same pitcher. But, with a late-game rally that brought us back from down two runs in the seventh, we took care of them in the title game.

The win was the culmination of years of work not only to improve, but to simply begin. To scratch by. To exist. After BU dropped its varsity baseball program in 1996, the idea of baseball here lay dormant. Disillusionment was obvious, detachment even more so. Those who had played baseball here distanced themselves from the University and the idea of resurrecting a program.

But in 1999, when Nirv Patel and Lazar Berman were shocked to find BU without a baseball program, they set to work. A few other students – not many – were interested. The club sports office wasn’t unreceptive, but it took a realist stance. How could it do otherwise? Without a field on campus, equipment or realizing the sincerity of the initiative, PERD found it tough to recognize the group of guys as an official club.

But the guys banded together. At 6 a.m., they practiced. It’s very cold in Boston at 6 a.m. There was no money and no games, but the dream was there. And it grew, as players slowly but continuously joined the cause. With more momentum and a more defined goal, PERD agreed to recognize the group as a club if they could come up with money, a field and opponents. With the same tenacity with which they practiced at 6 a.m., the team met the goals, and earned recognition as an official club in the spring of 2001.

Since then, things have snowballed. We joined NECBA, making our way to the championship game in the then-four-team league. Just like us, NECBA’s bloomed since then, with the teams now numbering seven – returnees BU, New Hampshire, New England, Maine, and newcomers Holy Cross, Emerson, and Fairfield – composing two divisions.

Until last year, we were a good, but not dominant team in the league. Generally the most talented team in the league, we had the consistency of a bad ump. We fell in the semifinals in 2002 and 2003, and watched New Hampshire laugh as they added almost guaranteed losses to the schedule each year.

Then last year came around. With over 60 players trying out for the team, we had not only the largest, but most talented group this club has ever seen. For the first time, cuts weren’t clear. Really, the only thing that was clear was that this team would be the one to do it, to finally stop toiling in oblivion and to make waves.

By the end of the fall, we’d posted a 12-2 record, beating UNH all four times and completely up-ending the once uneven rivalry. People on campus began realizing that we had not only a baseball team, but a good one. BU gave us unprecedented support, covering almost all of our equipment costs, and our outside support rose alongside that of the school. The process is by no means complete – it’s far from over. But now, every person who’s been part of this club’s evolution can stand back and admire the work, the leaps that we’re now making compared to those early, wary steps.

Then the admiration has to stop, because there’s more work to be done. We’re looking to join the National Club Baseball Association in either 2006 or ‘07. But in the meantime, we’ve got a title to defend.