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09/06/2017 12:00 AMCooper Thompson owes a lot of his success on the pitcher’s mound to the way he aggressively attacks opposing batters. Cooper played that card quite nicely this spring and became an ace in the hole for the Morgan baseball team in his senior season.
Cooper, a recent Morgan graduate, was a member of the Huskies when they reached consecutive Class S state finals in 2015 and 2016. As a senior captain this year, Cooper left everything on the field in his final high school foray by posting a 9-1 record with a stingy 0.74 earned-run average and 66 strikeouts in as many innings, while helping Morgan make the Class S semis. Cooper earned a wide variety of honors for excellent performance as he made the All-Shoreline Conference First Team and was named the Shoreline Conference Pitcher of the Year, in addition to earning spots on the New Haven Register All-Area Team, the Connecticut High School Coaches Association Class S All-State Team, and the All-Hartford Courant Team. On top of that, Cooper, who will continue his career at Division I Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, led the Huskies with 18 RBI and belted out a .315 batting average this season.
“I’ve always loved baseball. I’ve worked hard at it, love it, and my love for it hasn’t ceased yet,” Cooper says. “Between last year and this year, I got stronger and started attacking hitters more aggressively. I got ahead more in the count and pitched to my fielders. I had confidence, got into a good rhythm, and started believing in my pitches.”
When it comes to his go-to pitch, there’s no question that Cooper knows how to bring the heat. However, Cooper added a new wrinkle to his repertoire, and it helped his game ascend to a whole new level during the 2017 campaign.
“My fastball is my best pitch that I can throw in any count. Another one of my better pitches is my splitter, which I added this year and was almost unhittable,” Cooper says. “I got in much better shape over the years. My mechanics have stayed the same, but my mentality has gotten a lot better. I became the closer my sophomore year and got a lot more confident and kept getting better my junior season.”
Cooper was part of the best three-year stretch in the history of Morgan’s baseball program, and he looks back proudly at the achievements of his team. Cooper’s last game wearing the Huskies’ uniform served as a great example of the essence of what the program is all about.
“We are a close group, and we are still hanging out together now. I also had great coaches over the years,” Cooper says. “Playing in the state finals were great experiences. A state final is a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and I got two. We played such a close state semifinal game this year, and there was such energy in our dugout.”
John Litevich, who was Cooper’s head coach at Morgan, describes the right-hander as a multi-faceted pitcher who knows how to effectively mix up the weapons in his arsenal. Litevich adds that Cooper is the type of athlete who everyone on the team could look up to, because he owns all the traits of an exemplary leader.
“Cooper was unbelievable this year. He can throw all of his pitches for strikes and, while he was one of the hardest-throwing pitchers in the state, instead of trying to overpower everyone, he pitched using his curve, changeup, splitter, as well as his fastball, making him very difficult to hit,” says Litevich. “One of my favorite things about Cooper is he is afraid of nothing. He will take on any challenge you put to him and is always confident he will succeed, which is one of the characteristics that makes him a great teammate. Cooper is well liked by all and is very encouraging to the younger kids on the team. He is a very hard-working young man, and his work ethic will take him far in life. It has been an honor to coach him.”
Cooper now looks to pen the next chapter of his baseball career at Sacred Heart University by earning a spot on the Pioneers’ pitching staff. Going for a sports management degree, Cooper is ready to put in the long hours and take things day to day on the collegiate campus.
“My freshman year, I’m hoping to become a starter, or I could see myself in a bullpen role,” says Cooper, who thanks his mother, Mary Catherine Vieira, along with all of his coaches. “As far as academics, I’m just going to do the work, stay focused, and be on task, and be the best student-athlete I can be.”