COLLEGES:

Like the screen behind which he regularly pitches batting practice, Mike Gillespie has had to inch forward over the years.

Now 67, the longtime former USC coach has helped guide the UC Irvine baseball team within two wins of the College World Series in his first season at the helm of the Anteaters.

He has done so with his now-familiar regal presence, a cross between folksy affability and professorial eloquence. But not far beneath that supremely polished surface, there clearly flickers a competitive flame as intense as it was when he started in left field for the Trojans’ 1961 national champions.

Gillespie fed that hunger for winning as a coach, first for 16 seasons at College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita, then during 20 seasons at USC (1987 to 2006), where he led the Trojans to 15 NCAA tournament appearances, five trips to the CWS and the 1998 national championship.

He posted his 800th Division I win on May 24 and, including two stints with Team USA and last year’s assignment managing the Staten Island Yankees of the New York-Penn League, he is closing in on game No. 2,000 as a head coach.

“He still likes to compete and, trust me, he still likes to win,” said UCI pitching coach Ted Silva, who was one the mound for Cal State Fullerton when the Titans beat Gillespie’s USC squad, 11-5, in the 1995 national championship game.

UC Irvine sophomore outfielder Dillon Bell said the respect the players have for their coach, already notable before he took over for the departed Dave Serrano after preseason workouts had already begun, has only grown over the last few months.

“A guy his age doing everything he does, you know, he earns a lot of respect,” Bell said. “He’s still probably the same way he was when he was 40. He’s emotional and he’s an athlete and he hasn’t lost a step in anything, it seems. He’s pretty legit.”

A legitimate legend is how other players have put it. Those players, particularly veteran leaders such as Scott Gorgen, Aaron Lowenstein, Ben Orloff and Ollie Linton, have said it is an honor to play for Gillespie, with whom they have grown comfortable.

Answering a question in a news conference in Lincoln last weekend, Lowenstein caught himself referring to Gillespie as Mike, a development that stopped him in mid-sentence and prompted smiles from Gillespie and reporters.

“I can’t believe I just called him Mike,” Lowenstein said while reaching over to put his hands on the shoulders of his coach, seated in the chair next to him. “It’s Coach Gillespie.”

Still, while making some concessions to his old-school style, Gillespie remains a tad more grizzled than some younger coaches who are attempting to lead a generation of players often more comfortable with their own entitlement than outside authority.

Gillespie’s love can be of the tough variety and he is not shy about raising his voice or confronting his roster, which happens more than some players would like.

“He definitely airs us out a little more than Coach Serrano did,” said Gorgen, a junior All-American pitcher. “He’s a hard-nosed, old-school baseball coach. You can’t tell a 67-year-old man to do things a new way, after he has done them one way for 40 years. But he knows his stuff and I think he has been very good for us.”

Gillespie still seethes over mental and physical mistakes, but his cool can be cryogenic as well, as he often displays while not only discussing, but winning points with umpires.

The esteem with which he is held by his peers was emphasized by Oral Roberts head man Rob Walton, who called Gillespie one of the top five or six coaches in the country after his Golden Eagles lost twice to the Anteaters in the Lincoln Regional, including Sunday’s championship game.

Additionally, Gillespie deserves plenty of credit for not attempting to fix a program that was clearly not broken. By inheriting a young but mature club, with established senior leaders, he knew well enough to leave some things alone.

He marveled at the Anteaters’ player-run practices, while awaiting clearance to work with the team during an administrative delay in his hiring process.

And, he embraced a willingness to have fun — instilled by Serrano — that has helped build the kind of team chemistry that has helped foster another remarkable postseason run.

That run, on the heels of last year’s College World Series appearance, continues into the best-of-three Super Regional beginning Saturday against host LSU.

He has allowed, even relished, the pregame skits that some old-school coaches might think would diminish game-day focus.

He has allowed the dugout histrionics that help keep everyone on the roster involved and smiling, during the three- sometimes four-hour grind that is a college baseball game.

Though he developed a reputation for loving the long ball at USC, he has guided a small-ball attack that leads the nation in sacrifice bunts and has scored vital runs on squeeze bunts, double steals and a straight steal of home.

And he continues to relate to players young enough to be his grandchildren, as is openly displayed with his aforementioned batting practice deliveries.

“I take a lot of heat from players, because I throw under hittable,” said Gillespie, whose wry wit offers soothing contrast to his testier on-field demeanor. The same sense of humor has made him a celebrated banquet speaker for decades. “But I throw strikes. I just keep moving the screen up a little closer when I need to.”

Gillespie, Silva said, is not only willing but able to still do whatever is needed.

“His job is to lead us to those wins,” Silva said. “Whatever it takes: throwing BP; hitting fungos; running the offense; being head coach. He wears a lot of hats.”

BARRY FAULKNER may be reached at (714) 966-4615 or at barry.faulkner@latimes.com.