At the start of their first practice as Stanford baseball players, juniors Jeff Gilmore and Mark Romanczuk picked up their gloves and a ball and began to play catch together. Romanczuk was a highly regarded lefthanded recruit from Delaware who had been selected in the fifth round of the MLB draft. Gilmore, a native of Huntington Beach, Calif., was a righthander overshadowed by the high expectations swirling around his other classmates.

Three years later, Gilmore and Romanczuk have ascended to the top two spots in the Cardinal rotation. Their paths to success look nothing alike — a power pitcher, Romanczuk rode the bullet train to a starting role, while the craftier Gilmore arrived more quietly. But somehow they both landed in the same place, with complementing reputations for reliability and leadership.

Today, when the Cardinal warm up at practice, Gilmore and Romanczuk still play catch together.

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Romanczuk started his Cardinal career with a bang. He went 12-2 with a 4.01 earned-run average in his rookie season. The performance earned him one of four National Freshman of the Year honors.

He started the season in relief, posting three wins and two saves, and was moved into the starting rotation early in the year. The first Pacific-10 Conference start of his career was a sign of things to come: Romanczuk took the ball against Arizona State and spun a complete game, allowing only two earned runs and picking up a win in a crucial rubber game.

When Romanczuk won the first 12 decisions of his career, it was hard to tell that he wasn’t a veteran.

“In terms of poise, Mark is advanced for his age and as good as anybody we’ve had at this stage in his career,” Stanford head coach Mark Marquess said at the time.

Romanczuk’s dream season ended on a sour note, when he started and lost the final game of the College World Series to Rice. It was the shortest outing of his career, a one-inning stint in which he allowed four runs. The start left a bad taste in Romanczuk’s mouth, but he didn’t have time to think about it. Within days after the season ended, Romanczuk was on a plane to play for Team USA. He had a stellar summer, allowing only three earned runs in 36 innings for the 27-2 Americans.

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Gilmore watched his southpaw teammate’s startling breakout year — and just about every other play of the 2003 season — from the dugout. Gilmore made only three appearances in his freshman year for a grand total of 2 1 / 3 innings. He went to Alaska to play summer baseball with the frustration of an uneventful year on his shoulders.

Alaska, as it turned out, was the place where Gilmore began to transform as a pitcher. In May 2003, Gilmore met former Cardinal and current New York Yankees pitcher Mike Mussina, who imparted some wisdom on how to throw his signature knuckle curveball. Gilmore consumed the advice and began to toss the pitch during his summer outings.

“It brought out a new part of me and that’s a strikeout pitch,” Gilmore said. “On a two-strike count from sophomore year on, I had an option. Before I had to fool the hitter, I had to trick them.”

By the end of the summer, Gilmore had a 1.41 ERA in 32 innings of work for the Mat-Su Miners. Romanczuk, who was jet-setting with Team USA at the time, was the least surprised person in the world.

“Mark called me one day,” Gilmore remembered, “And he said ‘I looked at your numbers, you’re throwing great in Alaska. I knew you could do it, keep it up. When you come back, you’re going to be one of our guys.’ ”

Gilmore added: “We’re very different pitchers but we can learn from each other because of that.”

Gilmore said the ensuing fall was his most nerve-wracking time as a member of the Stanford team.

“I honestly believed that I had what it takes,” Gilmore said. “But I had a narrow window of opportunity to shine and prove myself in the fall.”

The coaching staff liked what they saw in fall workouts and Gilmore was immediately called upon out of the bullpen in his sophomore season. By the start of February he had his first collegiate start and his first collegiate win. The righty never slowed, collecting a 10-2 record with a 4.43 ERA.

The team’s Most Improved Player Award was a no-brainer.

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Romanczuk, meanwhile, carried his stellar summer form back to the Farm, where he blossomed into the team’s ace in 2004, going 11-3 with a 4.31 ERA. His numbers were nearly identical to the ones he posted in 2003, but last year, Romanczuk said, he learned how to pitch. Though his freshman numbers wouldn’t indicate it, he says that he was more of “thrower” than a pitcher back then.

“I’ve learned more of the finer points of pitching,” he said. “For example, how to change speeds on hitters, how to pitch down in the zone. That’s been one of the keys for me.”

He is still a power pitcher, with a low-90s heater and a devastating slider that has helped him tally 249 Ks in his Cardinal career. But Romanczuk has also developed a changeup this year that he uses to gets easy outs to keep his pitch count down.

An economics major, Romanczuk is more analytical than most pitchers you’ll meet. Before most of his starts last year, he would pore over everything he knew about each hitter on the opposing team and try to pitch to their strengths and weaknesses.

But early this year, his dissection of opposing lineups got him into trouble at times. He was reluctant to break from his game plan when things were not going his way.

Recently, his motto has been to simplify. Romanczuk lost his Friday night starting spot after allowing nine runs in seven innings in a start against Arizona State on April 15. Since that start, Romanczuk says, he has thought about what he needs to do to get hitters out, not what he could do to make them get themselves out.

“In my last couple starts, I haven’t focused so much on hitters’ weaknesses as I have on my strengths,” he said. “I just learned, ‘Hey, if I put my best foot forward, I’m going to get guys out, no matter what their strengths or weaknesses are.’ That’s given me a lot more confidence in my stuff. I’m trying to go with the flow and make adjustments whenever I need to.”

Romanczuk works with pitching coach Tom Kunis during his mid-week bullpen session, and they come up with a loose game plan for Romanczuk to follow in his weekend start. In some ways, he is going back to what made him successful during his freshman year, worrying less about the intricacies of pitching and letting his competitiveness guide him. Since the Arizona State game, he has allowed two runs or less in four of his five starts and tossed his third complete game this season.

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While Romanczuk has continued to refine his raw talent, Gilmore continued to uncover pieces of his. After a phenomenal sophomore season, he went back to Alaska. This time, after learning that his pitching coach would be Jack Krawczyk, who holds NCAA single-season and career saves records, Gilmore asked Krawczyk to show him his circle change-up.

The grip required for the change-up is, in Gilmore’s words, awkward, and difficult to master — Gilmore only got the pitch working at the end of fall practices this year. Now, the change, which is more deceptive and more versatile than the one Gilmore used previously, is the most effective pitch in his arsenal.

Armed with the enhanced pitch options, Gilmore settled into his Saturday starting role like he’d never known the bench, and is currently 9-2 (the best record on the staff), with a 3.61 ERA (the best among Stanford starters) and two complete games.

Gilmore moved into the Friday starting role for four weeks, though the junior downplays the shift.

“You can’t think about what pitcher you’re facing,” Gilmore said. “You’ll just psych yourself out that way. I have to think that I’m facing USC’s lineup, and our hitters are facing USC’s pitchers, and they’re going to do their best. And if I can keep it close, I’ll take my chances with that.”

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This weekend, Romanczuk will reclaim his familiar role as the team’s Friday night starter. But for all intents and purposes, the team has two aces.

“The staff has the confidence that both of those guys can get the job done any day,” sophomore reliever Blake Holler said. “Gilly’s gonna get guys to get themselves out, while Mark’s a bulldog and he’ll go after [hitters] and make them beat him. We feel so comfortable with them out there, knowing that they’re going to give us quality starts.”

Despite the obvious differences in pitching style, Romanczuk and Gilmore are very similar in their approach to the game — both are cerebral pitchers with unique talents for seeing things on the field that others might overlook. But because their experiences have differed so greatly, they bring very distinct leadership dynamics to the Cardinal pitching staff.

“I guess if anyone’s more of the vocal leader, it’s probably me,” Romanczuk said. “Gilly’s more of the quiet, reserved guy who leads by example. The great thing is that we kind of complement each other in that way.”

Gilmore added that their contrasting experiences and strengths appeal to different members of the staff, allowing the pair to support the pitching corps more successfully than either could on his own.

“Mark has an understanding of people, namely our coaches, better than anyone on the team and that’s the area in which he excels,” Gilmore said. “He can talk to the guys about those things. For me, I’m more of a mentor to the guys who aren’t pitching. I can relate to that because I’ve been there and I know what it takes.”

Romanczuk and Gilmore have come a long way during their three years at Stanford, both together and apart. The pair will likely split up after this season — Romanczuk is virtually guaranteed to be drafted in the first few rounds, and Gilmore is a good bet to leave as well. They will leave big shoes to fill in the Cardinal rotation, both in terms of their pitching ability and their leadership styles.

Before they go, Romanczuk and Gilmore will have one last crack at the College World Series, assuming the Cardinal make the playoffs. In the postseason, it can never hurt to have two aces in your deck. Especially when they have such different styles.