OMAHA, Neb. — Hundreds of folks in orange clustered around the sliding front doors of the Omaha Marriott Downtown on Saturday afternoon, making entrance difficult and exit dicey if you weren’t a Tennessee Volunteer.
An unsuspecting man in an Arkansas Razorbacks polo stepped outside for a stroll and was sent off by a loud chorus of boos. Cheers prevailed for most of a half-hour as Vols baseball players and coaches plodded through the throngs to two team buses set for Charles Schwab Field — all of a block away — to play for the first national championship in program history.
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The crowd got loud for fan favorites such as
Christian Moore exits the UT team hotel to the bus. pic.twitter.com/D77rsIHq1K
— Joe Rexrode (@joerexrode) June 22, 2024
The stadium was filling and then some at around 65 percent Vols lovers, with standing-room areas bloated well before first pitch. Tickets were hotter than the 88-degree sunshine — $560 was the cheapest that could be found right before the game on one ticket broker site that was offering one for $8,972 (!) nine hours earlier.
That’s what this moment meant to Tennessee fans who last cheered on a natty when Candace Parker and the late, great Pat Summitt delivered one in 2008. That’s what the moment said about their confidence, too, which is no small thing considering the tapestry of teases and embarrassments in the years since. But Vitello’s team has earned that.
Then it started playing baseball. Three-error, caught-looking, too-ponderous, hit-hard, sent-packing baseball in a 9-5 loss in the first game of the men’s College World Series finals. Vitello said Texas A&M “appeared more prepared.” Of the way his team responded to early struggles on a stage it hadn’t yet reached, amid so much anticipation, he said: “It kind of got emotional there, a little more emotional than it usually does.”
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The Aggies took instant charge in front of a crowd of 26,498, and by the way, they’re really good, too. They have an elite coach, too: Jim Schlossnagle. They’re looking for their first national title, too. They have an enormous fleet of supporters, too — more than enough on hand to give them juice as they pursue it.
Also, the Vols (58-13) are still in a good position to win this thing. The Aggies (53-13) had to take the opener based on the pitching matchups, and they did, but Tennessee should have the edge Sunday and again Monday if this gets to a deciding game. This is not the time for Tennessee fans to let thoughts of glory drift to memories of Butch Jones’ bricks or Greg Schiano’s Sunday, though I’m sure some won’t be able to resist.
This is the time to remember how forcefully and consistently this team has bounced back from the isolated shoddy performances. And it’s time for this team to do it again. It’s time for championship-level starting pitching after the combo of Chris Stamos and AJ Causey had another tough postseason outing.
“Like, we’re not new to this,” Causey said of his team’s expected response.
Staff ace Drew Beam has the season on his right arm Sunday, and if he can get it done, staff ace-in-the-hole Sechrist — a career provider of pitching and comic relief who is suddenly a dauntless starter — will have a natty on his left arm Monday. What a story that would be.
It’s not far-fetched. Schlossnagle went with lefty ace Ryan Prager in the opener, and it worked. Prager was careful about offering the powerful Vols many fastballs and kept them off-balance as his offense found seven early runs.
Also, the Aggies had to win a game with Prager starting and Stamos and Causey on the other end of things. And Prager still had to throw 81 pitches and gave up eight hits in just four innings of work. The Vols did some things to make things easier later — just as they did in their last loss, the second game against
That performance was preceded by an abundance of outside questions about how the Vols would handle the moment. The answer was emphatic.
Dylan dials long distance to get two runs back.
Pitching change coming for the Aggies.
📺 https://t.co/3WxxhYjcwY (ESPN)#OTH // #BeatTAMU pic.twitter.com/X04ZLx9eKn
— Tennessee Baseball (@Vol_Baseball) June 23, 2024
And the Vols’ ability to keep fighting Saturday and turn a 7-1 deficit into a 9-5 game with some drama — forcing the Aggies to spend 104 pitches from a good, not deep bullpen in the process — bodes well for the rest of the series.
The Vols sure were sloppy in letting that deficit get so large, though. This was a vibe-wrecker. A figurative punch landed. A reminder of the way Tennessee teams can tease. If it’s a confidence shaker for this particular Tennessee team, that would be the biggest surprise of its season, right at the end.
(Photo of Cal Stark tagging out Jackson Appel in the third inning: Peter Aiken / Getty Images)