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Sunday - June 11, 2006

Super Regionals - Day 2

Well, the teams that won on Friday all won again yesterday so the first four spots in the CWS have been decided: Clemson, Cal State Fullerton, Georgia Tech, and North Carolina. Missouri was not able to do much of anything against the Cal State Fullerton starter Laren Gagnier. He held the Tigers hitless through the first 7.2 innings when they finally broke through on a solo home run by catcher J. C. Field. Alas, that was the only run the Tigers managed to get across. The Titans, meanwhile, scored 3 in the first and never looked back. Elsewhere, Clemson had to come from behind again (this time in the 8th rather than the 9th) to break the Golden Eagles' hearts. The Alabama/North Carolina game had a pretty exciting finish. Trailing 2-4, North Carolina scored 4 in the bottom of the 8th to go up by 2 (3 of those runs on a 3-run home run by Chad Flack). Alabama's Alex Avila then hit his own 3-run home run in the top of the 9th to retake the lead. Chad Flack...yes, again...hit a 2-run walk-off home run in the bottom of the inning to grab the CWS berth. Wow. I felt rather sorry for the stunned Alabama crowd. Just minutes earlier, they'd been on an amazing high. And, then boom. I could relate.

Yesterday, I wrote about the South Carolina/Georgia game in progress. South Carolina went on to win 15-6. South Carolina hit 2 more home runs in the game (both 3-run shots). So, all of the South Carolina runs came off home runs. 8 home runs, 15 runs scored. 5 of those home runs were hit back-to-back in the 2nd. I've never seen anything like it. In other 1st game action, Rice stomped all over Oklahoma and won 10-4. We were not able to see any of that game. Miami and Ole Miss slugged it out with Ole Miss ending out on top 11-9. And, Oregon State managed to edge out Stanford 4-3. I got to see a little bit of that game, but not much...as we were being held hostage to the no-hitter blow-out being thrown by Cal State Fullerton. So, once again, the home teams came out 3-1 on Day 1 for the other side of the bracket. I doubt they'll go that way again today. It's practically unheard of for 8 best-of-3 series to all be decided in 2 games. But you never know.

And, I suppose it's worth pointing out that Oregon State remains the only team from last year's CWS field that still has a chance to return to Omaha this year (they're the only team that made it to the Super Regional round). If Stanford manages to win the next two games, it'll be the first time in about 50 years that no teams from the previous field returned to the CWS. Amazing. 'Course, Stanford has to win those two games. We shall see. As they say: that's why they play the games.

Posted by Joanna at 9:59 AM