« Game 54: Texas at Kansas State (Big 12 Tournament) | Main | Texas will host a regional »

Sunday - May 24, 2009

Big 12 Tournament - Day 4 summary

Four games on the schedule today. Which makes for a long day. Whew. I worked on this post as the day went on...but held off posting 'til the end of the day.

Game 1: Kansas at Baylor. Both teams were out of the running as far as the tournament was concerned; neither could make it into the Championship game. But Baylor was hoping another win would help them get an at-large bid to a Regional. Baylor jumped out to a 6-0 lead, scoring 3 in the 1st and 3 in the 2nd. Kansas answered with a Tony Thompson grand slam in the 3rd. But, that was it for Kansas. Baylor scored two more (1 in the 4th and 1 in the 7th) to win the first game of the day 8-4.

Game 2: Kansas State at Texas. The Horns kept up with the "regular-season 'swept' team wins the tournament game" trend I noted yesterday. Technically, I don't suppose the Jayhawks swept the Horns since the last game ended in a tie. But, the Horns certainly did not win any of the regular season games between the two teams. Today, they held the Jayhawks off, winning 4-2. Nice game for the Horns to move on to the Championship game tomorrow. Hmmmm...going back to that trend thing, none of the other match-ups today featured swept teams but there's a possibility of Texas playing in one of those games tomorrow. Texas swept the Sooners during the regular season. They split series with the other three teams in Pool 2. 'Guess that means we should root for someone other than the Sooners to make it to the Championship game, eh? Or we can assume that any good trend can only last so long. Right? Right.

Game 3: Oklahoma at Missouri. Wow. Missouri beat OU 5-4. The Sooners had chances in the 8th and 9th to tie the game up...and possibly pull ahead. But, they came up short. The Sooners had the bases loaded with 1 out in the 8th. Kaleb Herren hit into a 6-4-3 double play. In the 9th, the Sooners got runners on the corners with nobody out. Aaron Baker struck out swinging. Runners still at the corners, 1 out. J.T. Wise (Big 12 Player of the Year) hit into a 6-3 double play. The shortstop made a great play to stop the ball headed into cf. He raced to 2b and beat the runner from 1b and then gunned the ball to 1b to complete the double play. That was a very exciting end to the game. Yikes. Oklahoma's out of the Championship game. If Tech wins the late game this evening, they play tomorrow. If the Aggies win, Mizzou plays tomorrow. OU and A&M are both out of contention.

As Game 3 ended, they reported that rain appeared to be nearing the ballpark. They did not report what the "in case of rain" plan was.

Game 4: Texas A&M at Texas Tech. The start time for the late game was delayed due to a rain storm that blew through about 7:15 (the game was scheduled to start at 7:30). I think the actual rain lasted about 30-45 minutes. I had the video stream up during the rain delay and was amused to see the crew watering down the dirt areas of the infield after they pulled off the tarp (at about 8:50). By 9 o'clock the bases were on the field and all looked ready for the game to start. A couple of minutes later, the folks running the video feed figured out how to share news with us and put a note across the screen saying the game would start at 9:15. And, it did. I listened to the Aggie radio guys; no point in listening to the satellite radio guys if there's an alternative, eh? The Aggies jumped out on top early...scoring 10 in the first 4 innings. The Red Raiders scored 4 in the first 4 and that was it. The Aggies scored one more run in the 6th and won 11-4. The game lasted nearly 3 hours and 10 minutes. Wow.

So, it'll be Texas and Missouri in the Championship game. G'night!

Posted by Joanna at 12:23 AM