OMAHA, Neb. — Jay Johnson has coached in the College World Series finals before, and he has won his share of big baseball games.
To him, nothing compared with Thursday night.
“That is one of the greatest moments in my entire life, what happened on the field tonight,” the second-year Tigers coach said after his team’s 2-0 victory in 11 innings over No. 1 national seed Wake Forest clinched a spot in the CWS finals.
Tommy White hit Camden Minacci’s first pitch into the left-field seats at Charles Schwab Field for a two-run homer in the bottom of the 11th, sending the No. 5 Tigers (52-16) to the best-of-three title showdown with No. 2 Florida (53-15) that starts Saturday night. The pairing of Southeastern Conference programs is a rematch of the 2017 CWS finals, which the Gators swept for their first national championship in baseball.
“Now that we’re here, it’s not a surprise,” Johnson said. “This is the first team I’ve coached that I think can win a national championship. Hands down.”
That’s saying something. Johnson nearly won one in 2016 when he was at Arizona, which to Coastal Carolina in a CWS finals that went the distance.
LSU became the first team to hand Wake Forest (54-12) consecutive losses this season. The Tigers won 5-2 on Wednesday night to set up a rematch needed to determine the winner of the double-elimination bracket.
“We just slayed a giant tonight,” Johnson said.
Florida is 3-0 in Omaha this year and didn’t have to play Thursday, having handed TCU its second loss in Omaha with a 3-2 win on Wednesday afternoon.
In Thursday’s game, LSU’s Dylan Crews singled to left leading off the bottom of the 11th against Michael Massey (3-1), prompting Demon Deacons coach Tom Walter to call on his star closer. Minacci’s first pitch to LSU’s home run leader was a 90 mph slider, and White sent it out for his 23rd of the year.
“I thought a heater was coming,” White said. “But I was very amped up, and I saw a slider that was up. I put my bat head to it. That was about it.”
It was a fitting end to one of the most anticipated games in CWS history without a title on the line. LSU was the consensus No. 1 team in the major polls from the start of the season until May 8. Wake Forest was the consensus No. 1 the rest of the way. The teams split their first two meetings in Omaha this week, with the Demon Deacons winning 3-2 on Monday.
The pitching matchup between LSU’s Paul Skenes and Wake Forest’s Rhett Lowder set this one apart from the first two. The two are projected top-10 overall picks in next month’s amateur draft for Major League Baseball, and they matched zeroes deep into the game. Wake Forest came in 18-0 in games Lowder had started.
Skenes allowed two hits and walked one batter before turning the game over to Thatcher Hurd (7-3) to start the ninth, and his nine strikeouts made him the SEC’s single-season record holder. Skenes has 209 strikeouts in 122 2/3 innings; previous record holder Ben McDonald had 202 in 152 1/3 for LSU in 1989.
Skenes’ fastball was a tick down from Saturday, when he hit at least 100 mph 46 times against Tennessee, but it was still plenty good — as were his slider and changeup.
Lowder mixed his mid-90s fastball with a sharp slider and allowed three hits, walked two batters and struck out six in an efficient seven innings. Of his 88 pitches, 63 were strikes.
“Paul Skenes was fantastic, and Rhett matched him pitch for pitch,” Walter said. “It was one of the best-pitched college baseball games I’ve ever seen. And Michael Massey behind him was dominant. And Hurd was, too, for LSU. Runs were hard to come by. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find a way to scratch one across there those first 10 or so innings.”
Skenes was backed up by a spot-on defense, never more than in the eighth inning, when Justin Johnson drew a leadoff walk and ended up on third on a wild pitch.
Johnson started running for home when Marek Houston bunted to the right side. First baseman Tre’ Morgan charged, picked up the ball and made a diving flip to catcher Alex Milazzo, who tagged Johnson for the second out.
“He showed everyone in the country he’s the most athletic first baseman out there. I saw him lay the bunt down, and Tre’ came flying in to make the play and pick me up,” said Skenes, who got out of the inning when left fielder Josh Pearson, playing shallow, caught Tommy Hawke’s liner.
The Demon Deacons played without Nick Kurtz, a .353 hitter with 24 home runs. The Baylor School graduate aggravated a rib injury in pregame warmups and was scratched from the lineup 20 minutes before the first pitch.
Wake Forest batted just .158 and totaled eight runs in four games in Omaha after outscoring its opponents 75-16 in five NCAA tournament games leading to the CWS. The Demon Deacons were in the CWS for just the third time and the first time since 1955, when they won the national championship.
They don’t expect to wait 68 years for their next appearance.
“I think just the evolution of Wake Forest baseball, to get to where we are now, it’s something to be proud of,” Lowder said. “This is the standard for Wake Forest baseball now.”