Cardinals Stay Alive

By Howie Lindsey

Special to CollegeBaseballInsider.com

@howielindsey

 

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Late Saturday night, Louisville senior third baseman Zach Lucas sent a text out to all of his teammates. Facing possible elimination Sunday at the hands of Cal State Fullerton, Lucas told No. 3 seed Louisville: "We're not ending it here."

 

The Cardinals (47-17) got a strong seven-inning, nine-strikeout performance from freshman All-American lefty Brendan McKay and plenty of support at the plate during a 9-3 win over the Titans (38-23) Sunday afternoon at Jim Patterson Stadium.

 

"I just feel like we weren't ready to be done," junior first baseman Danny Rosenbaum said. "Every year we've got a new team. For me, I've been here three years, and this is one of my favorite teams I've been on, and all I can think about is I don't want to end it here."

 

Rosenbaum, who was 4 for 5 with an RBI and a run, and the Cardinals forced a crucial Game 3 Monday night at 7:05 p.m. (ESPN2) to decide the best-of-three series and send the winning team to the College World Series.

 

"We played well," Louisville coach Dan McDonnell said with a smile. "Obviously, Brendan gave us a great start. Offensively, we had a lot of quality at-bats and, you know, blessed and excited that we get a chance to show up again tomorrow and play again. This is a fun time of the year, and I think our kids showed that."

 

Louisville got 16 hits from a total of seven different players as 15 different players played at least an inning. Meanwhile the Cardinals' pitchers scattered 10 hits and three earned runs with 12 strikeouts. 

 

"Welp, that was an ass-whoopin,'" Fullerton coach Rick Vanderhook said as he opened the post-game press conference. Vanderhook said he felt like all but a couple of his hitters were guessing at pitches and guessing wrongly for most of the game. 

 

"[Louisville pitching coach] Roger [Williams] just had us chasing all day," Vanderhook said. "When we were thinking fastball it was a curve and when we thought curve he'd bring a fastball."

 

McKay was particularly effective. With a fastball in the low 90s and two other effective pitches for strikes, he allowed a run in the second, but settled in to record five shutout innings. 

 

"I just went up there with a relaxed mentality," McKay said. "You can't get tense or try to amp yourself up just because it's an elimination game. To try to help your team win, you just need to go out there, pound the strike zone, and get your team in the dugout so they can hit."

 

The Cardinals challenged Fullerton's freshman starter John Gavin early, sending him to the dugout after just 2.1 innings, his shortest outing of the season. He was replaced by righty Chad Hockin, who got the Titans out of the third inning, but not before Louisville added a run. 

 

Louisville regained its one-run lead in the third inning when Rosenbaum turned on a two-out single to left field to score Nick Solak from second base. Solak singled to start the inning. The Cardinals threatened but stranded Corey Ray and Rosenbaum. 

 

Fullerton appeared to be challenging to come back in the fourth inning with a pair of runners on base and one out, but Louisville senior second baseman Sutton Whiting snagged a line drive and then rocketed a quick throw to second for a double-play to end the inning.

 

Louisville broke the game open in the sixth. Rosenbaum improved to 3 for 3 with a double to start the top of the inning. He moved to third on a wild pitch and, after Colby Fitch struck out, scored on a single to left field by Devin Hairston. 

 

Then Louisville's nine-hole hitter, Logan Taylor, who had just entered the game in centerfield a couple of innings before, took a 1-0 pitch for a 350-foot ride over the left-field fence into the hundreds of fans sitting on the berm. Taylor showed bunt on the first pitch and Hockin brushed him back from the plate with a high fastball near his chin. Taylor made Hockin pay on the next pitch, delivering his first career home run. 

"The first pitch was high and I just got out of the way. I don't want to get hit in the head," Taylor said. "... It's pretty incredible. It's my first career jack here, so it was a good one to remember for me."

 

The sixth-inning rally was mostly the product of the bottom of Louisville's order. 

 

"It's what makes great lineups – six through nine," McDonnell said. "In the last few weeks, our six through nine players have been playing very well. You know what Devin has done also Logan Taylor, and Rosenbaum. You just have to have that balance up and down the lineup where everybody in the country is good one through five. That I have always said that the difference maker is six through nine. Fortunately our guys have played well, especially in the last few weeks."

 

Taylor's homer chased Hockin, and Fullerton brought in freshman side-armed lefty Turner Buis. After Buis struck out Whiting, Louisville's big inning continued when Solak reached on a walk and then scored from first on a double to left field by Ray. Fullerton shifted its outfielders drastically to right field anticipating a right-field hit by Ray, but Ray's bloop hit bounced 20 feet from the left field line. 

 

Fullerton scored a pair of runs in the eighth inning, which were charged to McKay, and another charged to reliever Jake Sparger, but Louisville's lead was safe. The Cardinals pushed their lead to 9-3 in the top of the ninth when Hairston singled and advanced to second on a balk. He was knocked in two pitches later by Taylor on a single to right field. 

 

The Cardinals and Titans will decide the series Monday night, with the winner heading to Omaha. Louisville has made back-to-back trips to Omaha, with their first trip coming in 2007. Fullerton has four NCAA titles and has been to the College World Series 16 times, including seven times since 1999. 

 

Louisville is expected to put draft-eligible sophomore Josh Rogers (8-1, 3.53 ERA) on the mound while Fullerton will go with freshman Connor Seabold (5-3, 2.92 ERA). 

 

NOTES 

 

·    Tough Outing: Fullerton freshman John Gavin (7-3) gave up a pair of runs on five hits in 2.1 innings. He had two strikeouts and issued one walk. Reliever Chad Hockin allowed five hits and three earned runs in three innings with five strikeouts. Fullerton used five different pitchers. 

·    Long-hair, Don't Care: Superfan Keith Franklin made his way from Southern California to Louisville for the Super Regional series. The jean-jacket wearing, wild-hair-slinging, bull-horn-voiced fan cheered every pitch and every hit for the Titans. Franklin, who had been a UC Irvine fan for decades, was banned from Irvine games last season after running onto the field with a 1,000 win banner after a game. 

·    An assist to CSX? In the sixth inning, a southbound CSX train blasted its horn just as Brendan McKay's strikeout pitch crossed home plate vs. Fullerton's Dustin Vaught. It was a 3-2 count, and Vaught tossed his bat to the dugout and started to take his base before turning in disbelief to look at the home plate umpire. 

·    Take it easy: McKay, Louisville's two-way star freshman, got an earful from teammates during Friday's practice. Doing field work at first base, the other pitchers would yell "Easy" at him each time he went to throw the ball after a catch at first. The coaches asked him to "Take it easy" throwing that day because he would be starting on the mound Sunday, and his teammates were giving him a hard time about it.