A best-of-three super regional baseball series for the top-ranked Tennessee Volunteers has suddenly become a do-or-die.
Tennessee’s methodical march to a third College World Series trip in four seasons hit a surprising roadblock Saturday afternoon inside Lindsey Nelson Stadium, where the Evansville Purple Aces rallied from a 4-0 deficit in the fourth inning to defeat the Vols 10-8. The teams will vie again at 6 p.m. Sunday on ESPNU, with the winner moving on to Omaha, Nebraska, and the loser calling it a year.
“You’re in a three-round bout, and you’re going to take blows and give blows,” Tennessee coach Tony Vitello said afterward in a news conference. “Today, they delivered a couple more blows than we did. We were one win away from being in a really good position, but it didn’t happen that way.”
The Vols will now have to rely on their regular-season success in Southeastern Conference rubber matches. They lost their first in league play at Alabama but then defeated Ole Miss, Georgia, Auburn, Kentucky and Florida once those series got to 1-1.
Those five straight triumphs in rubber matches helped the Vols set a single-season program record with nine consecutive SEC series wins.
“We’ve been in a lot of 1-1 series throughout the year,” Tennessee senior catcher Cal Stark said. “We know what it looks like, and we know how to treat the game.”
Said Vitello: “No question it’s a benefit.”
The Vols will carry a 54-12 record into the deciding game, while the Purple Aces are 39-25. Evansville was seeded fourth in last weekend’s Greenville Regional and on Saturday became the first fourth seed in a regional to defeat the NCAA tournament’s top overall seed.
Regional fourth seeds had been 0-30 against the No. 1 overall seed, falling to 0-30 with Evansville’s 11-6 loss to Tennessee on Friday afternoon.
“I am beyond proud of the fight and determination that our team showed today in the middle innings to help us get this win,” Purple Aces coach Wes Carroll said. “We got down early, but we had multiple guys step up and make plays today — be it at the plate, on the mound or in the field — to help us get this win. I couldn’t be more proud of the team than I am right now.”
Tennessee jumped on Evansville in the first inning with home runs by Blake Burke, Dylan Dreiling and Hunter Ensley for a 3-0 lead. Dreiling’s homer was his 20th of the season, giving the Vols three players with at least that many in the same year (Christian Moore has 30 and Billy Amick 22) for the first time.
Vols starting pitcher Drew Beam had a no-hitter going through three innings before quickly unraveling, which he eventually did against Mississippi State in the SEC tournament and against Indiana in last weekend’s Knoxville Regional. Kirby Connell and Nate Snead struggled in relief as the Purple Aces shockingly rang up 10 runs in a three-inning stretch to turn a 4-0 deficit into a 10-5 advantage.
Cal McGinnis hit a two-run homer in the fourth inning, Brendan Hord had a solo shot in the sixth and Kip Fougerousse added a two-run blast in the sixth to spearhead Evansville’s stunning 10-1 run. McGinnis and Fougerousse each finished with three RBIs, while Tennessee went completely cold in the middle innings before awakening with a three-run ninth.
“They switched pitchers, and it took us a minute to adjust,” Vitello said. “You’ll take runs any way you can get them. It would have been nice if there were some guys on base when we hit homers, but it was the first inning, and it went down the way it did.
“It was kind of a unique situation.”
Tennessee now finds itself in a very familiar situation and will turn to its usual Sunday starter, Zander Sechrist. Although Sechrist took a line drive off his left knee last Sunday during the Knoxville Regional final against Southern Mississippi, he stayed in the game.
Vitello described Sechrist’s knee as a “nonissue” all week.
“He’s our guy in the locker room,” Vitello said. “He’s our guy on the field. He’s got the ball, and we’ll worry about the rest later.”
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com.