By Ron Wynn
Despite failing to make the finals of the SEC Tournament, the Vanderbilt Commodores were chosen as one of the hosts for an NCAA regional tournament Monday.
They were one of six SEC teams to get that honor out of 16 regional hosts and 64 teams chosen overall.
Vanderbilt will open against Xavier on Friday night at Hawkins Field. The Commodores are seeded number one among the four schools. Oregon is the number two seed, followed by Clemson and Xavier. The other SEC schools who’ll be playing in the NCAA regionals include Florida, Ole Miss, LSU and South Carolina.
There was some concern that after the Commodores were defeated by Ole Miss that they might have missed out on hosting a regional. But their 41-18 record includes 19 victories over teams ranked in the nation’s Top 50. Their overall RPI ranking entering the NCAA field is number seven.
Vanderbilt has hosted regional tournaments four times overall, and three times in the last four years. Should they prevail in this tournament, they would face the winner of the Bloomington regional, where Indiana is considered a heavy favorite to prevail.
The Commodores were defending SEC champions before the tournament began, but a combination of pitching woes and batting failures quickly ended any hopes of repeating. They did win their opener against Tennessee 3-2, ousting the Vols from the field and ending any chances they had of getting into the NCAAs.
But things turned bad afterwards. They were outscored over their next two games against LSU and Ole Miss by a combined 18-3, with the 7-2 defeat by the Rebels ending their tournament run. The Commodores stranded 20 runners during those games, and had only four extra-base hits. Meanwhile their pitchers were getting pounded, with both starters and relievers proving unable to prevent big innings or get crucial outs. Still, the Commodores have only lost a handful of games outside the SEC, something that bodes well for their tournament prospects.
Things didn’t go as well for other area baseball teams. Both Tennessee Tech and Lipscomb lost championship games over the weekend. Tennessee Tech lost 4-2 to Jacksonville State in the OVC finals held in Jackson. Lipscomb lost 7-1 to Kennesaw State in the Atlantic Sun championship game in Fort Meyers, Florida. Tech had an early lead, scoring twice on Zach Stephens’ two-run homer.
Jacksonville State surged ahead in the seventh on a pair of run-scoring singles and held on for their sixth straight tournament win. Although they dropped the opener, Jacksonville State set an OVC Tournament record with their six consecutive wins. Tennessee Tech finished the year 40-19. They had three players selected to the All-OVC team, Dylan Bosheers, Daniel Miles and David Hess.
Lipscomb was able to score only once against Kennesaw State, with Nick Rome’s second inning single driving in their lone run. Kennesaw State blew the game open with three runs in the seventh and three more in the eighth.
Lipscomb ended a successful year with a 33-28 record, tying their school mark for wins in a season and setting a new record for winning percentage.
