A postseason war: Tennessee and Texas A&M baseball to face off one last time in the MCWS finals

OMAHA, Neb. – Tennessee and Texas A&M have waited nearly eight decades to finally win a Men’s College World Series. They can wait one more night.

It’s simple now, after the Volunteers rallied past the Aggies 4-1 Sunday in Game 2 of the championship finals. One last game – the 73rd of the long season for Tennessee, the 68th for Texas A&M. and to the victor goes the dogpile. Their road has gone from February’s opening day chill to a 100-degree day in Omaha, and now it’s time for a decision. The Aggies nearly won Sunday, were but seven outs away. The Vols nearly lost, sinking under the weight of their left-on-base total. But then the day changed and maybe the series. “It was an SEC war,” Tennessee coach Tony Vitello said afterward. “Or just a postseason war.”

Did the series just sway Tennessee’s way for good with the Vols exhilaration – and possibly relief – from Sunday’s late scramble, which was fueled by what they do best, hitting balls out of the park? Or will Texas A&M just trot out more hot pitchers, who came close to squeezing the last life out of Tennessee Sunday and might next time? All that must be sorted out Monday night.

This is the 2024 MCWS going into its last day:

Vitello said he’d be putting the brown noise on his sound machine to sleep better Sunday night. As for Monday, “we’ll approach pregame as we see fit. And then 6:09, just play ball.”

Zander Sechrist, the Vols likely starting pitcher, said he will try to stay with his usual approach. “At the end of the day it’s still baseball. This is just baseball out here with a title on it. I’m not trying to downplay it nor up-play it I’m just trying to stay even keel about it.” How would he prepare during the day Monday for the biggest moment of his career in the evening? Sechrist said he’d have lunch.

Texas A&M coach Jim Schlossnagle mentioned how he has Justin Lamkin to start and big guns Evan Aschenbeck and Josh Stewart out of the bullpen. Lamkin has struck out 15 in eight scoreless innings in Omaha while Aschenbeck and Stewart struck out 11 Vols Saturday in game 1.

“We’re going into the last game of the season and Lamkin is ready to roll. And Stewart now has a day (of rest) and Aschenbeck has a day. I’ll take that,” Schlossnagle said. “Obviously we’re playing a great team. So we’ll see.”

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The Aggie who provided his team’s only run in game 2, Jace LaViolette, aimed to focus on the mental side, coming off a taunt Sunday near-miss.

“That’s where our mental work comes into play,” he said. “It’s still the same game. It’s still one pitch at a time. Literally we try to teach ourselves to do everything one at a time. And as long as we keep putting good quality at-bats together and keep doing what we’ve been doing this whole tournament, this whole postseason, honestly, I feel like we can do everything we want. We can win the whole thing.”

If there is such a thing as momentum, that might belong to Tennessee after its 30th come-from-behind win this season. No team in the nation had more, And yet the Vols are not exactly having a buffet on the Texas A&M pitching, and the Aggies know it.

That’s what made Sunday such an anxious enterprise. To review Tennessee’s survival:

Tick . . . tick . . . tick . . .

It was getting late for the Vols. A 1-0 Texas A&M lead on LaViolette’s homer that looked so unimposing in the first inning was an ominous number staring them in the faces by the seventh. Was the incendiary device that is the Tennessee offense really go down for good in the championship finals 1-0?

Tick . . . tick . . . tick . . .

Look who had done the muting for the Aggies.

Zane Badmaev had pitched one inning in a month and not started a game since his Tarleton days in 2020. But he started Sunday and provided a scoreless first.

Then Chris Cortez, he of the nuclear stuff but maddeningly erratic command. Cortez would strike out seven in his 4.1 innings. He would also walk five, dodging Tennessee scoring chances like raindrops.

Then Kaiden Wilson, who had pitched 8.2 innings all season and had an 8.31 earned run average.

Against that threesome, the Vols mighty lineup had produced . . . nothing.

The heat was rising on both teams, figuratively and literally. Texas A&M could almost reach out and touch a championship. The Aggies would become the first team in 11 years to go through the NCAA Tournament unbeaten. Stadium workers were already rolling up the podium platforms in case they were needed for a trophy presentation.

All Tennessee was worried about was survival.

“You could feel it get tense,” LaViolette said.

In the seventh inning, Sechrist decided to change his location in the Vols dugout.

“I plopped myself in front of the bathroom just to switch spots and get things going. I was really not watching the game at all,” he said.

Tick . . . tick  . . tick . . .

Dylan Dreiling came to the plate with two out and Christian Moore at second base in the seventh. Dreiling had struggled against the Texas A&M pitching like nearly everyone in a Tennessee uniform, striking out twice. If he was retired, the Vols would be 0-for-17 with runners on base this day, 2-for-21 with men in scoring position in two games. Such numbers had the potential of haunting Tennessee baseball for posterity. “I think it was probably because there’s a little extra tension or a little extra try-hard,” Vitello said of some unproductive at-bats with runners on base. “But it’s kind of hard to not have that.” 

Surely, sooner or later, Tennessee would turn into Tennessee. But it better be sooner.

Tick . . . tick . . . tick  . . .

BOOM!

Dreiling hit a two-run homer that put the Aggies behind for the first time in this MCWS.

Cal Stark followed with a two-run shot in the eighth to make it a more comfortable 4-1. Until that moment he had been 0-for-16 in the MCWS with nine strikeouts. In the sixth inning he had grounded into a double play for the first time all season to kill a threat. For the Vols catcher, Omaha had been an offensive nightmare. But not anymore. “Felt pretty good, finally getting that first hit out of the way,” he said. “Every kid dreams about playing at this stage and being able to do that late in the game like that, it was pretty cool and something I’ll never forget.

Four runs might not be an explosion by Tennessee 2024 standards but they were plenty loud enough, especially with four crucial shutout innings by Vols reliever Aaron Combs. They kept Sechrist in his new seat back by the bathroom.

“Dylan hits a two-run homer so I do it the next inning and Cal hits his two-run homer. I don’t know what I’m going to do tomorrow,” he said. “Maybe I won’t sit on the bench, maybe I’ll go to that spot.”

The key for the Vols had been to work up Cortez’ pitch count. When he threw strikes, he was nearly untouchable. Tennessee’s best chance was to force him out and get to someone else in the bullpen. Cortez finally had to leave in the sixth after 99 pitches.

The homers came off Wilson. Tennessee has hit 182 of those this season, but these may have been the biggest.

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“We always know we’re one inning away,” Stark said. “So we really just knew that just keep doing what we’ve been doing all year, just trying to get quality at-bats, pass it to the next guy. “

Tennessee’s power had finally spoken, but even then it was not easy. Texas A&M had the tying run at the plate in the bottom of the ninth. And the last out by Ryan Targac was a deep drive to the warning track.

“In that situation, if you had your druthers, you’d like to have the last at-bat,” Vitello said. “Because you know the ninth inning is going to be full of drama.”

And so, winner-take-all and loser-stays-titleless Monday night.

From the Tennessee side, Vitello: “I felt we were more true to who we were today in pregame, in the dugout, during the game. And, again, it’s easy to say that because we end up doing okay on the scoreboard. But I’d rather go into battle with that group the way they showed up today and hope they do the same tomorrow.”

From Texas A&M, LaViolette: “This is the most comfortable we felt playing baseball in a while. I have full faith in this team. I think every single person on this team has full faith in ourselves. I mean, at the end of the day, it’s another baseball game. Like, elimination or not, we always put our pants on the same, we all do the things the same. It’s about who can settle in first and the quickest. It’s baseball and we get to play tomorrow, as Coach said, we don’t have to. It’s a blessing to wake up and be able to play this game. Obviously it sucks that we lost today but I get to wake up tomorrow and play the game I love.”

With two traditional programs so determined to win a first championship, it’s probably it has come to this. When Targac’s deep fly was caught Sunday to end the game, workers began to roll the platforms back up the ramp from the field. “Well,” one said “it was a good dry run.”

They’ll need those platforms Monday night. For somebody.