Willie Randolph won two World Series titles as a player for the New York Yankees and earned four more rings as a coach with the club. The U.S. squad he's led to the Premier 12 final doesn't have nearly the pedigree of those teams, but the 61-year-old skipper is as proud of this group, made up of minor leaguers, as he is of any of the other teams he's been a part of during his many years in the game.

Randolph was tapped by USA Baseball to manage the team at the Premier 12 and brought four seasons of managerial experience with the New York Mets (2005-2008) to the job. However, because of scheduling and timing conflicts, Randolph was given the tough task of taking a group of players he didn't know much about across the globe to compete against the likes of Japan, South Korea and others.

"We're doing it on the fly," Randolph said. "That's why this is so special for me, because I've never been in a situation like this, where literally we put you together as a group and just drop you in a pot, and you've gotta try to mix it all together and make a stew out of it. So far, it's tasting pretty good."

Randolph has just about cooked up a winner. The U.S. went 4-2 en route to the semifinals and finished as the second-place team in Group B. The Americans' win over Mexico set up a tilt against South Korea in Saturday's final.

The U.S. reached the title game with no household names on its roster. Major League Baseball didn't make players from any club's 40-man roster available, and other timing issues kept the Americans from talking to other players until September. That meant losing potential targets to the Arizona Fall League and other winter leagues.

Team USA general manager Dan Campbell worked with what he had available and then turned the roster over to Randolph. The manager didn't know much about the players he was tasked with leading, and many of the players knew even less about each other.

"Most of the guys on the team hadn't even ever met each other before," said pitcher Zeke Spruill. "The first couple of days was kind of like getting to know each other, learning new names, new faces. After those first couple of days, it was almost like we'd been playing together for a year already."

Randolph said that fast-acting cohesiveness made his job much easier.

"It's been a challenge, but that's the beauty of it in a way," he said. "These guys have made it easy for us to put them in spots because their focus has been about winning from day one. When you have a group of guys who want to win, and they're focused on that, it makes everything else kind of fall into place.

"The first thing I said to them when we got together is 'make sure you check your ego at the door.' Everyone. Because there'll be times when we put guys in this spot and that spot because we're trying to feel out what we can do as a group and no one should be offended or upset about it, your focus is winning the championship. They've responded that way. They're competitors, and every once in a while, guys are going to be a little upset. That's OK, because we want them to be upset because they want to play."

Randolph has made many of the right moves on the U.S. team's path to the final. He's also learned a lot about his players and himself during the journey, which he said is something he's never experienced before.

"I'm really excited for these guys, I've been in a lot of situations, I've won a lot of championships in my time, but the way I feel right now going into (the final) I'm as proud as any team that I've been a part of."