KNOXVILLE - Tensions flared Sunday at Lindsey Nelson Stadium as a weekend of intrastate college baseball culminated with Middle Tennessee State University notching a 7-5, 12-inning win over Tennessee in the final game of the Tri-Star Classic.
MTSU's Blake Benefield hit a decisive two-run homer in the top of the 12th inning before the Volunteers' Andre Lipcius capped an otherwise productive weekend by grounding into a double play in the bottom half, stifling a potential rally.
Tennessee's Pete Derkay collided with MTSU second baseman Ryan Kemp while sliding into second on the play, leaving Kemp writhing in pain as the Blue Raiders and their fans appeared to take issue with Derkay's slide. Their momentary displeasure turned to celebration when Benito Santiago struck out swinging to end the game.
"Those guys treated it like it was their (dang) world series," Lipcius said. "Take it how you see it, but we don't like the way they talked to us on our field."
Tennessee's 5-4 win over MTSU on Tuesday set the stage for Sunday's rematch. In between, the Vols (7-5) lost 10-9 to East Tennessee State University on Friday and beat Memphis 2-1 on Saturday. They rallied from an 4-0 deficit on Sunday but left two runners on base in the ninth, allowing the game to reach extra innings.
Tennessee freshman reliever Garrett Crochet (1-2) took the loss.
"It's (crappy), is what it is," Tennessee coach Tony Vitello said. "That's probably not the appropriate word, but that's the way it is. It changes a week from being a really good week for our team and a step forward to, quite frankly, not a good week. To have it happen on your field and have someone else celebrating on your field - I don't know, maybe if they hear this it'll make it even sweeter for them - but that's what it is."
Bright spots from the weekend for Tennessee were the complete-game pitching performance of sophomore Garrett Stallings (2-0) in the victory over Memphis and the hitting of Lipcius, a sophomore shortstop and an emerging leader for the young Vols in their first season under Vitello.
Lipcius reached base in 14 of 25 plate appearances during Tennessee's five games over the week. He ripped two home runs in Friday's loss to ETSU and was 3-for-6 with an RBI and two runs Sunday.
"It shows what you can do when you buy in to the mentality you need to be successful," Lipcius said. "Coming into this week, I was doing all right, but this week I bought in to the mentality of what it means to be successful. I think if a lot more guys on the team do that, then we'll be really successful."
Tennessee hosts James Madison on Tuesday and Wednesday before playing a three-game series at Cincinnati next weekend.
"People have got to grow up really fast because we're really young," Lipcius said. "If people start buying in, we'll be good."
Can a game like Sunday serve as motivation?
"If we ever lose to someone like them again - we can't keep putting that on," Lipcius said. "We lost to ETSU and now them. This can't keep going if we want to be successful."
Vitello attempted to defuse the tension around Derkay's slide, noting it was one of a couple such pithy moments in the game.
"If you break them down, there's really not a whole lot there," Vitello said. "But when you have two teams that are from the state playing for the second time in one week and it's the end of a long week, everything kind of gets highlighted or overexaggerated, so to speak."
Contact David Cobb at dcobb@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @DavidWCobb and on Facebook at facebook.com/volsupdate.